The Time Turner
by Inkling1
Summary: Chapter 8 UP! OOP spoilers, Dumbledore said that killing Voldemort was not satisfactory. Here is an alternative.
1. The Boy without a Name

Disclaimer: The only thing I own in this has got no name. JK has the rest. Lucky.  
  
He was tired, so tired that his thoughts kept fading into a sort of dizzying blackness somewhere between sleep and wakefulness. He refused to let himself sleep, though. After all, if he did, then he would lose his chance.  
  
The boy did not know his own name, and it suited him just fine to be nameless. He made up names, mostly using those of characters from old Muggle fiction. He did not have to keep one, for there was no one who would have called him by it. As of late, he had taken to calling himself Edmond Dantés, after the protagonist of Alexandre Dumas's The Count of Monte Cristo. Every time he thought of it, he was reaffirming his vow for revenge.  
  
The boy, Edmond for the sake of having something to call him, was a prisoner. He could not remember a time where he had not been. So by the time Voldemort returned, and he was given to the Dark Lord as part of one of the Death-Eater's atonement, he was used to it. He had expected to die, but he had not. Voldemort had seemed sickeningly happy to see Edmond. Why? It was a question that burned in Edmond's head every waking moment. Who was he that the Dark Lord let live, even locked up like this? What could he do? For that was the only reason that made any sense at all. Edmond had some ability, some power that was needed. Unfortunately for Voldemort, constant abuse and neglect as a child had forged an intense hate for anyone associated with the Dark Mark and Edmond was no more likely to comply with their wishes than Dumbledore was, as had been proven.  
  
But even the strongest will fall eventually. Edmond knew he was running out of time; it was harder and harder to bear the torture, especially when he did not know the extent of his power. Then, he got the first hint of what he might do when he overheard one of the Death-Eaters repeat, word for word, one of Edmond's own thought processes. The man had called it a dream, and, when it happened twice more to different men, Edmond decided he wasn't insane. His thoughts were somehow being funneled to someone else. What if he could control it? So, he practiced, and eventually the thoughts were going to the right people, instead of random ones. But having a Death-Eater know what he thought about in the deep recesses of the night would not help him in the least. He had to get the message to someone outside his ring of acquaintances. He spent weeks on it, and finally, completely coincidentally, he caught a hold of someone else's thread of conscious, one he did not recognize. After careful probing, undetectable snooping, he found the identity of the thread's owner. He was not surprised; it seemed fitting that the first outside mind he should stumble across would belong to Harry Potter.  
  
The easy part was over. Now he had to make Harry believe that those dreams he was having were the feeble attempts of another fifteen-year-old boy begging for help half a country away. He began again at the painfully exhausting thought waves. He did not know what to think that would convince this boy he had never met. He only knew that if he did not, then before the month was out He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named would have almost certainly won the battle against He-Without-A-Name.  
  
* * * *  
  
It did not take that many nights for Harry Potter to realize that this extraordinarily odd, doggedly repeating dream was in some way significant. After all, he had experience with dreams before. But this one was different. He awoke with no burning scar on his forehead, nothing that would make him sure that the dream meant something except for the very fact that he was sure. He couldn't even put the dream into words to tell somebody about it. All he could count on remembering when he awoke was a boy, about his age, whispering urgently, and yet with unnerving calm, "Please help me." That, and the memory of being terrified. It wasn't Voldemort, definitely not. This was not one of those thought exchanges so frequent the year before. No, those had stopped. This was from the boy. He was asking for help, begging for it.  
  
It was getting to the point where he was dreading sleep. Something had to be done, but he didn't even know how he knew THAT. His first instinct was to talk to Hermione, Dumbledore, or Mr. Weasley, someone who might know what was going on. Even Ron might be of help there. He didn't, though. He was still far too haunted with the memory of what had happened the last time he had bothered to listen to a dream. So, he put it off and put it off, until the boy seemed to be so desperate that Harry awoke with tears on his cheeks. Only then did he tell it to his friends.  
  
"Every night for at least two weeks," Hermione thought aloud after he finished the account. "I don't know anything about dreams. Personally, I think that the Muggle interpretation of random firings of neurons makes the most since. But then again, for you.you are sure it's not one of those dreams from Voldemort?"  
  
Ron and Hermione argued for a while about whether there was a meaning to dreams. When they started repeating themselves, Harry broke in. "All right, it doesn't matter if dreams have a meaning or not. All I know is that the boy in my dream is alive, and no matter how many.what did you say, Hermione.neurons are firing, he still needs our help. He's in trouble."  
  
"Well, he's been in trouble for two weeks now. Don't you think that it's a little late?" Hermione asked.  
  
"No, he would have stopped asking if it was," Harry replied, and knew it was true even as he said it.  
  
Hermione looked disgusted. Harry suspected this was just a little too close to Divination for her. "Look," Ron said, "just tell Dumbledore. I mean, if your dream is true, and there is a boy being held prisoner by You-Know-Who. That's pretty much the most you can do. It's not like you're going to be able to execute some sort of rescue mission on your own. I say tell Dumbledore and let it go."  
  
Ron went a bit red in the face, and Harry realized that he had, maybe accidentally, maybe not, made an unspoken reference to the attempt to "rescue" Sirius. Harry was not about to make the implication any clearer, and instead asked Hermione's opinion.  
  
Grudgingly, she agreed that Ron had named the only thing Harry could hope to do. So, after breakfast, he made the trek to Dumbledore's office, and recounted the dream for a second time. Its effect was much more profound on the headmaster. He grilled Harry for every little detail in the dream. He said very little on what it meant, except that he was as certain as Harry on the matter that it was from a source other than Voldemort.  
  
Finally, after what seemed like hours, Dumbledore stared out his window and murmured, "If what you say is true, if that boy is alive, then I made an unforgivable mistake many years ago, Harry. But I swear that I will try to help him, with everything that is in my power to do."  
  
And he would say no more.  
  
Harry left more confused than he thought it was possible to be. What had Dumbledore done that was so awful? Try as he might, he could come up with no satisfactory answer.  
  
* * * *  
  
He had tired of the name Edmond, for he did not feel that his years as an innocent prisoner would ever pass. But, since there weren't a lot of books to read during his imprisonment, he kept the name much longer than he liked it. He was tired all the time now, and not just from his late night messages. Voldemort had gotten nearly as sick of hitting Edmond with the Cruciatus curse as Edmond himself. So, after a few months of watching it have little or no effect barring a lot of screaming and swearing, the Dark Lord had dropped the matter completely and had resorted to more physical blows, whacking Edmond with whatever sturdy object happened to be in the vicinity. This was an improvement, according to Edmond. Unfortunately, it had to be coupled with a steep decline in food. He was hungry all the time, after a while, he realized he was slowly, slowly starving to death. He lay on his bed nearly all the time, straying in and out of sleep. He sent his messages earlier and earlier, not even caring if they were received. Finally, he stopped all together. It had been three weeks since the first time. If Harry hadn't pieced it together now, he never would.  
  
Edmond fell asleep again, oblivious to the rest of the world in his body's desperate struggle to preserve energy. If he felt himself be lifted out of his bed and out of his cell, he did not react.  
  
Edmond never could say whether it was the bright light, the smell, or the noise that woke him up. He certainly jolted awake too fast for it to have been natural. His surroundings were not only completely unfamiliar, he had never even imagined that such a place existed. It was warm and happy. Not that he was very well acquainted with happiness, but he always imagined it might feel like this.room. And it smelt wonderful. He saw a plate of food next to him; it was still hot. There were birds chirping outside, and a friendly-sounding ruckus coming from below.  
  
"My God," he whispered, "I've died and gone to Heaven."  
  
It made sense.  
  
"Nothing so drastic," a voice said from the other side of the room. He turned around quickly, panting with the effort it took.  
  
"Who are you?" he asked suspiciously; false bravado coming as easily to his lips as it always had.  
  
"I'm George Weasley and it's about bloody time you woke up; we've been waiting for three days now."  
  
George meant nothing to Edmond, but Weasley did. He eyed the boy carefully. He certainly looked like the descriptions of his family, but Edmond was prone to not believing, and he wasn't about to change because he was in a room with food. (By this point, he had forgotten about the happiness, or unconsciously dismissed it as his own reaction to the smell of the breakfast.) George, if it was he, sensed Edmond's doubt and said, "I'll get Mum; she's been worried sick over you. She's been making a new dish of food for you every time the last one got cold."  
  
Right, thought Edmond, just like that. Someone I've never met worries about me and actually takes time to see that I am comfortable. He laughed silently at the idea. George looked at him expectantly, but the time for whatever reply/reaction he had been waiting for passed, and he left the room. Edmond listened to George walk downstairs and turned to the food. He never suspected poison, since the one thing Voldemort had never tried to do to him was kill him. He ate the bread, a banana, and half the glass of milk before he heard footsteps on the stairs again. Out of sheer habit, he closed his eyes and slowed his breath.  
  
Molly Weasley was not at all fooled. After all, it had been only three or four minutes since the boy had awoken; he could not possibly have consumed that much food and gone back to sleep. However, she was also aware of the discretion needed in this situation. She started to speak, "You have a hearty appetite, but it's hardly surprising considering you're as tall as my eldest son and as wide as my sister's toddler. If you don't want to talk to me, I understand. Lord knows I wouldn't be talking if I were in your place."  
  
Keeping his eyes closed, Edmond said softly, "I don't know where I am. I don't know if I should believe you. I don't know anything. Unfortunately, that seems to be a moot point in most aspects of my life."  
  
"You are in safe hands. You must trust us."  
  
"Trust," the boy spat, sitting up, "I'll never trust anyone as long as I live. Even the people I should have been able to trust betrayed me. If you listened, you'll notice I never asked if I could trust you; I asked if I could believe you. And you still haven't answered that question." He lay back down, exhausted by the outburst, and added, his voice completely devoid of the fury it had held. "Thank you for the food. It was wonderful."  
  
Mrs. Weasley had no idea how to reply to that, so she sat down and stroked the long, dirty, black hair of Edmond. He pulled away as if he had been burned. "Don't touch me," he said, again unemotional.  
  
His head still tingled from Mrs. Weasley's hand. All of his life, Edmond had associated touch with pain. For once, none of it came, and a flood of fear and confusion washed over him because of it. "Who are you? Where am I? How did I get here?"  
  
He did not expect the questions to be answered. He did expect someone to tell him what the ulterior motives for feeding him were. No one did.  
  
Instead Mrs. Weasley launched into a long description in answer to all of his earlier queries. She offered no proof but her word and seemed completely unaware that anything else might be needed. Edmond was, in a word, baffled by this woman who seemed to be no threat, and, dare he even think it, seemed to have Edmond's best interests at heart.  
  
"Who are you, dear?" she asked kindly.  
  
"If I knew, I would tell you, but I do not. I was hoping that you might know. Or you might know who I could be? Or something?" Edmond replied.  
  
"What do you mean you don't know?"  
  
"It's quite simple; no one ever told me my name or my background. For all I know my mother was the earth and my father the sky and I sprung out of the water in a burst of flame. I have no name but what I invent for myself. Lately, I call myself Edmond," he said, but the back of his mind cried out Lie! Lie! Why are you lying? She's here to help. He did not try to correct himself, although he knew his surname better than he would have liked.  
  
"How long, then, must you have been a prisoner?"  
  
"All my life, that I can remember at any rate. And I can remember when I was three. I was treated as a servant, though, until Voldemort came back. That's when they locked me up."  
  
Mrs. Weasley shuddered at the mention of the forbidden name, but Edmond had always used it. He was very adamant that no one would know that he was afraid of Voldemort in the deep recesses of his heart. It seemed, though, that his fear or lack thereof was not the topic of conversation, rather, Mrs. Weasley seemed shocked at the indifference with which Edmond related his life tale, or the lie he had nearly convinced himself was true.  
  
"You have suffered far more than your share," she whispered, "never again will that be your fate."  
  
Edmond laughed harshly, a discordant, jarring sound. "Never say never, Mrs. Weasley, especially with things that will be affected by outside sources. I will suffer, and probably sooner than any of us would like."  
  
"Why do you say that?" she asked, taken aback.  
  
"Because it is true. If Voldemort would waste the time to keep me alive, then he will not let me go so easily as you seem to think. Just because I am out of his keep does not mean I am out of his thoughts. I don't know the reason for which he let or forced me to live, but it must be something. He is not known for letting his victims survive. He must have had a reason. I was hoping that my rescuer might know it. Speaking of rescue, it was Harry Potter's dream that tipped you off, right?"  
  
"Yes, how did you know?"  
  
"Of course I sent it. Did you really think it was coincidence? At any rate, I must speak with him. Of all people, I understand his motives. Of all people, I can be reasonably sure he speaks the truth of his identity."  
  
Edmond could see he was confusing his hostess as much as he was confused. He supposed it was because he did not speak with the cares of a child, and yet his demeanor was so obviously young. He had been forced to act wisely in a world of adults, and he could not slip back into his Peter- Pan persona. He had not used that name in a great many years.  
  
"You will talk to Harry soon enough. It is Christmas Holidays at Hogwarts right now. Either you can go there, or he can come here. I think, though, that Dumbledore will want a look at you himself."  
  
Edmond nodded, changing location did not bother him. He had spent most of his childhood being shoved around from Death-Eater to Death-Eater to keep his existence a secret. Now, he was fifteen and he was finally going to Hogwarts. Granted, he was going as a curiosity for the Headmaster to look at, without wand or student status, but he was still going. He marveled at his own attitude as his mouth formed the words, before his mind could catch up and think better of it, "Can I have some more food?"  
  
Mrs. Weasley laughed and nodded. Here was an emotion she was familiar with. 


	2. Heritage

Disclaimer: I own nothing except for Edmond/Peter.  
  
Edmond was explaining, for the umpteenth time in a few short days, that he indeed did not know his name or his identity. This time it was to Dumbledore. Why was it so hard to grasp, he wondered, that a person might not know who he was? One could not know what one had never been told. He tried to be calm, at least on the outside, but it was difficult. He supposed that Dumbledore knew it was a lie because, in fact, Edmond knew at least who his parents were. He sensed that Dumbledore also knew more than he was telling, and it hurt badly. His mind, he realized, had unwittingly created a sort of paradise of Hogwarts. After all, its headmaster intimidated Voldemort. What had he expected? He felt ashamed at even hoping. His suspicion made him distrust. His fear made him scared to hope. He came to a conclusion; a world of safety and care only existed between the covers of a book by some idealistic Muggle. Some of his disgust must have appeared on his face, for Dumbledore interrupted whatever Edmond had been droning on about.  
  
"Are you even listening to what you're saying?" It was not, needless to say, what Edmond had been expecting to hear.  
  
He replied immediately, though, "I've heard it all before. Why should I bother?"  
  
Dumbledore nodded almost absentmindedly. "Now," Edmond remarked softly, "you are the one not listening."  
  
The headmaster smiled. After a moment, he finally said, "You are far more obstinate and argumentative than I would have expected for someone."  
  
"What euphemism are you looking for?" Edmond butted in. "Someone in my particular situation, someone with my background, why don't you just say it? Someone whose spent his whole life under torture. I'm like I am because it didn't matter what I said. I was going to get hit anyway."  
  
Dumbledore definitely wouldn't meet his eyes anymore. Edmond felt some sick bit of satisfaction well up inside him. He had won his battle, whatever battle it was, he didn't know. He had spent his life in a silent battle against everyone else he knew. He could not imagine the real reason Dumbledore had looked away. He had never been introduced to compassion, except in tales of fiction. It was, to give him some credit, the first time he had ever felt a pang of guilt at a verbal victory. He subconsciously settled down to what he thought was a gentler attitude after that first outburst. It wasn't a kindness; it was a precaution. He did not understand what he was dealing with, and he dared not be bold until he understood. He did not apologize; Dumbledore did.  
  
"What I did does not deserve forgiveness.Edmond," Dumbledore began, "I assumed where I had no right to."  
  
"I don't want to hear it," Edmond butted it, "for it certainly isn't anything I haven't heard before. I forgave you for it a long time ago. You assumption is only foolish in hindsight. I should, by all accounts, be dead. Expecting me to be alive was nearly expecting a reincarnation. I forgive you for that mistake."  
  
"Ah, so you know who you are after all?"  
  
"I only know my parents' names, and that was more than enough family history for me," Edmond smiled bitterly.  
  
"You told me you did not know who you were," Dumbledore frowned.  
  
"Am I my parents? I don't really see how that would work. I would be a mixture of oil and water then. I do not know who I as an individual am. A child is not his parents nor his guardian."  
  
Dumbledore nodded, looking pleased. "Your name is Peter."  
  
Edmond, or rather Peter, laughed aloud at that. "Talk about ironic! How did I come across that particular one? I hope you're not one of those people who judge others by what their parents or namesakes were! Now, let's make this a full circle; how am I related to Cornelius Fudge?" That last bit was sarcasm, he hoped.  
  
"So you know the whole story of." Dumbledore began, but newly named Peter butted in a childish singsong voice:  
  
"Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot, Prongs  
  
One is dead, one has fled  
What a curious bunch of friends  
One has tail, one's in jail  
Loyal to the end of ends  
Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot, Prongs"  
  
"Of course I know the story. You think I wouldn't by this point? Well, I know the song needs revising at this point, considering the fact that the Marauders' situations have changed drastically in the last two years. I just have had other things to think about."  
  
Dumbledore looked frankly surprised at the callousness with which Peter treated the subject. Peter said softly, "Look Dumbledore, I am sorry that James Potter is dead, and Remus Lupin, from what I have heard, does not deserve his fate, but as for the rest of them, to hell."  
  
"Sirius Black was innocent of his crimes," Dumbledore corrected.  
  
"Of his crime of betraying the Potters and killing Wormtail, yes, he has been absolved of those by me, and rightfully so. But there are other crimes not so easily written off. Other crimes that he is indeed guilty of committing."  
  
"I am sorry you feel that way, Peter," Dumbledore sighed, "for if you but had the chance to get to know him."  
  
"Then I would hate him even more, Professor. If I knew him to be good, then what he did will become even more unforgivable in my eyes. If I knew him to be evil, then what he did will become the expected, and that would be unbearable. I do not want to know him. He might be my father by blood, but the connection is strengthened by no other means."  
  
Dumbledore said nothing. Peter continued, "I see what you are thinking. You wonder what I must think of my mother. I cannot even describe how much I hate her. You cannot fathom it."  
  
"You owe some fealty to your parents; you cannot just throw them off as your worst enemies."  
  
"They are not my worst enemies, first off. And the only reason I have to be loyal to them is the fact that they gave me life, for they certainly have done nothing for me since. And there have been many nights when I have begged for non-existence, or at least death."  
  
"Sirius would have been a father to you if he had not been unjustly sent to Azkaban, Peter. Even now, after all these years, he would jump at the chance to make it up, but, alas, that is not to be. Be fair, even if fairness has not been shown to you. He did not choose to abandon you."  
  
"Yes, he did, actually," Peter returned adamantly. "He chose his love of revenge over his love for his son. He didn't have to go after Wormtail. He could have gone into hiding and let it go."  
  
"Would you have?"  
  
"I would not have left what I still had to destroy what had taken other things from me."  
  
"You are sure? How do you know what you have not experienced."  
  
"Trust me Dumbledore, I am sure. I am far more certain of this than many things in my life. Yet, let's not dwell on could-haves, should-haves, and would-haves. They are almost as unproductive as ifs," Peter said, trying unsuccessfully to avoid painful subjects without letting anyone know they were painful.  
  
"Can I trust you to stay here for a moment? You're arrival is wholly unanticipated. I need to speak with someone before making my decision."  
  
"You can trust me, Dumbledore; my left arm scarred, but not with that particular mark."  
  
Peter was surprised when the headmaster took him at his words and left. Maybe he really had gotten the professor wrong. But he could not understand those emotions at all, much more the actions. Later, he began to suspect that whatever person Dumbledore needed to talk to was not about his decision on whatever he was deciding about. Later, when he started to understand who Dumbledore was, he began to realize that the professor had left Peter just when Peter needed to be alone. Something no one else had ever even come close to doing.  
  
I lied to Molly Weasley, he thought miserably. I lied because I was ashamed of myself. I did not want her to look down on me because of my heritage. I am such a hypocrite.  
  
But then again, many would argue that his ancestry was something to hide. After all, to the majority of the population, Sirius Black (even though they thought him a serial killer) was still the good side of the family. He had told the truth when he said he would never forgive his parents. One night, his father had gotten drunk and picked up the first hooker who looked at him. Unfortunately for Peter (because he maintained that never existing would be better than his life), it was no prostitute, but a Death-Eater. Bellatrix Lestrange, as a matter of fact. Peter was the bastard result of incest. He had gathered, over the years, that it had been a set up. Voldemort had wanted him to be born, and Peter did not know why. He hoped, sincerely, that Dumbledore would have some information over that area. Not that, his pessimistic self reminded him, anyone would ever bother telling me that lovely piece of news.  
  
His pessimism was actually as close to optimism as he could get. For all of his remembered nearly sixteen years, he had been a prisoner in the houses of various Death-Eaters. His earliest memory was of his mother handing him over to the Dark Lord, gladly. There simply hadn't been any kind of joy in his life, aside from books. He held that his survival was completely indebted to those Muggle tales. They had not been easy to procure, but they were fellow prisoners, the spoils of war. Nearly every Death-Eater had shelves and shelves of books stolen from their previous owners, Muggles who had crossed the Dark Lord in his first rising. They had calmed him, and by thinking about their unreality helped him forget his reality. Even now, when worry was once again upon him, he instinctively mouthed his mantra of names.  
  
"Chaucer, Shakespeare, Milton, Dumas, Barrie, Burnett, Dickens, Lewis, Tolkien." on and on for several minutes, through centuries of writing and all around the world. Dumbledore had still not come back and his lips continued to speak without the urging of his mind, now moving to his favorite characters from each of the books, nearly all of them had been his name at some point in time. He was on "Artful Dodger" when the headmaster returned from the errand spawned either from necessity or imagination.  
  
"Oliver Twist?" he asked.  
  
Peter grinned wryly, "I've had a bit of free time on my hands of late. I've been catching up on my reading."  
  
"Personally, I am partial to David Copperfield."  
  
Peter laughed inwardly. It was the first time in nearly five years he had discussed a book with anyone. Yet it was not fated to be a long conversation, as almost immediately Dumbledore changed the subject, "How old are you, Peter?"  
  
"Nearly sixteen."  
  
"How nearly?"  
  
"About three months. My birthday is in late March."  
  
"Think you can survive that long?"  
  
"Why does it matter? I mean, I have survived this long, and I might continue to do so until my sixteenth birthday. But what's to stop someone from killing me April first, or tomorrow for that matter?"  
  
"As to tomorrow, we can only pray to keep you safe. As to April first, you honestly don't know why Voldemort kept you alive? Or is this another one of your I-don't-know-who-I-am-but-I-know-more-about-my- familiy's-history-than-anyone-else things?"  
  
"I don't know, if I knew than I could possibly use it to my advantage," Peter said honestly after a pause.  
  
"Peter, it matters if you make it to sixteen because if you do, then you will be virtually immortal. The reason Voldemort wanted you, the reason we all want you, is because you have the potential to be the most powerful person that ever walked the earth."  
  
"Including Merlin?" Peter laughed at the absurdity.  
  
"Including Merlin," Dumbledore nodded seriously.  
  
And Peter realized he was telling the truth. "All I have to do is survive?"  
  
Another nod.  
Oh, well, that explains a lot, the lucid part of him thought. The most powerful person ever. Immortal. Why, why couldn't I have been born three months earlier?  
  
Then the logical part of him butted in, Voldemort will never let anyone so powerful as you survive long enough to destroy him. You're Frodo, but you have neither Gandalf nor Aragorn to distract the Dark Lord from his quarry. There are more than nine Nazgul in this Earth.  
  
But that attitude of doom had been his for many years. This was a game to Peter, be it as it may a game of very high stakes. He had been playing insane games like this all his life. Now, three months was a challenge he was more than willing to accept.  
  
"Sound the hunting horn," he smiled. "The fox hunt just got more interesting."  
  
Dumbledore stared, and even Peter could not blame him. "Oh, Dumbledore, what did you expect of me? I am not doing battle with death itself, only Death-Eaters."  
  
Dumbledore looked far from satisfied, but Peter could give nothing more than what he considered the truth.  
  
"You really should have gotten to know your father," Dumbledore said with a sad smile.  
  
Peter shook his head mentally at the headmaster's incomprehension. He really, really hated his father. Nothing was going to change that. 


	3. Incubi

Disclaimer: If it looks familiar, it isn't mine.  
  
Peter adapted rapidly to his new life. He was odd, very odd, and no one could quite overlook it. He flinched where he shouldn't have, made comments that no one really understood, and laughed at strange humor. Yet, at the same time, he was remarkably normal, all things considered. He decided, after only brief meditation, that Voldemort no longer wanted him alive. He had escaped, and he had taken refuge with Dumbledore. In short, it did not require a doctorate in astrophysics, or metaphysics for that matter, to figure out that Peter was not about to side with the Dark Lord. And, if he truly was destined to be more powerful than Voldemort, there was no way You-Know-Who was stupid enough to let him live.  
  
This, however, did not phase him. He was actually sort of enjoying himself. But the vacation was ending, and he considered the return of the students with some trepidation. There were far too many children of Death-Eaters. He did not relish the thought of running into some of them.  
  
"So, am I a student or not?" Peter asked Dumbledore one day. He had so far been staying in Dumbledore's office all day, except for a few excursions to the library. (Oh, glorious library!)  
  
Dumbledore didn't answer for a moment. Peter repeated the question. The headmaster asked, "Do you want to be a student? How could you be? You are nearly sixteen, and yet you have never picked up a wand."  
  
"No one has ever asked me what I want before." Peter commented slowly. "I don't really know how to respond, but I know the theory behind everything in the books. I've studied the books, just never put any of it to practice."  
  
"Why?"  
  
"It started out as crazy dreaming. If I ever did, by some chance, get a hold of a wand, I needed to know what to do with it. But you can't just learn the two spells that would be helpful. You have to learn the basics first. That's what I did. I got myself up to a level where I could at least be a mediocre wizard, assuming I was one, of course."  
  
"Didn't you know for sure?"  
  
"Professor, weird things have been happening to me all my life. How could I tell if it was maturing magic or not?"  
  
Dumbledore laughed and agreed. "But you still haven't answered my question. Do you want to be a student?"  
  
"No," Peter said after the longest pause yet, "I couldn't."  
  
"Is there any particular reason that you'll let me know?"  
  
"Yes, I can't sit in the same class as them, the children of the Death- Eaters. My hate for them is different than a school rivalry. I have spent many nights thinking of ways to kill them. I can't face that, never."  
  
"I understand, but someday you will have to be a part of the same world they are a part of."  
  
"No, not if I can help it. Just because their parents escaped justice doesn't mean that it should be the norm. They have their comeuppance to pay. I will give it to them."  
  
"Death is not the answer to stop killing, Peter."  
  
"How true, I am not speaking of death, though. There are shorter ways, safer ways. I have had a long time to think about this, all my life as a matter of fact."  
  
"Hence you call yourself Edmond."  
  
"You are well read in Muggle literature, Professor. All the same, let's change the subject. If I am not to be a student, what am I to be? I can't very well stay in this little Rapunzel's tower for the next three months, lovely as it is. I have a feeling it would get in the way of your work."  
  
They talked in this vein for a quite a while longer, Peter asserting that he didn't care, Dumbledore adamant that he did. Neither could think of what to do with the boy. He was forever a misfit, never belonging, always in the way.  
  
"Tell me, what do you want?" Dumbledore asked again.  
  
"I want.I want to spend the day in the library and not have to worry about who sees me. I want to explore this castle. I want to be free. I guess I want the impossible."  
  
Dumbledore sat for some time, deep in thought. Then he smiled. "Not impossible, there is a way."  
  
* * * *  
  
"You're the boy from my dream!" Harry Potter cried upon seeing Peter, then his voice changed to a much softer tone. "You.you look like.someone I used to know."  
  
"Yes, I am the boy from the dream. I am also permanently indebted to you for noticing I was real, and listening to my message. I am sorry to have disturbed your sleep," Peter returned easily, completely ignoring that other comment.  
  
He knew who he looked like, his father. Sirius Black.  
  
Harry nodded, "You're welcome; it was nothing."  
  
Dumbledore looked approvingly on during the exchange, then said, "Harry, I must ask a rather large favor of you."  
  
Harry looked slightly worried to Peter, but he said nothing.  
  
"This is Peter. His father was a friend to yours. He needs to borrow you father's cloak for a time."  
  
"Why?" Harry asked.  
  
"What good would a cloak do me.oh, that cloak." Peter thought aloud. "Harry, I wouldn't have asked this of you. However, I cannot be around some of the people in this school. I cannot be seen by them, and I seriously doubt I could refrain from killing some of them if I was forced in a social situation with them."  
  
Harry laughed. Peter didn't. Harry figured out that Peter wasn't joking relatively quickly.  
  
"Er.can I have some background information?" asked Harry awkwardly.  
  
"You don't want to get into my family history." This time, it was Peter laughing. But Dumbledore gave a relatively short overview of what Peter had told him, which was an incredibly short summary of what Peter knew. It was sufficient enough to at least double the size of Harry's eyes, though. Peter could see his mind working. Sirius's son, and yet, also, somehow, the son of Bellatrix Lestrange, the woman who had killed Sirius. And his namesake was all but the murderer of Harry's parents. As Peter himself had said, there was no history as mixed up as his own. It took an extraordinarily extensive time to convince Harry to give loan of his Invisibility Cloak to this boy.  
  
"I knew I should have kept the name Edmond," Peter muttered under his breath. No one else heard him.  
  
Finally, Harry consented. The Cloak fit wonderfully. "Don't run into anything, or leave it somewhere," Harry advised.  
  
"Understood."  
  
So, when the end of the holidays came, Peter had already been gallivanting around Hogwarts like he owned it for three days. He made himself well acquainted with Harry, Ron, and Hermione, mostly by coming up behind them and starting random conversations with no introductions whatsoever. They did not seem to like it half as well as he did.  
  
"Are you going to continue to do this when everyone's back?" Hermione cried once after Peter had been following them for about an hour and had only decided to enter the conversation at the very end of that point.  
  
"Yes," he answered without hesitation. They all groaned at the news. Peter actually laughed for the fun of it. Life, he thought, is good.  
  
The more rational part of his mind reminded him that if life was good, then something was definitely rotten in the state of Denmark. He knew it, but didn't particularly care. He had even taken to removing the Cloak every once and while to talk to Harry, Ron, and Hermione with the normal expressions attributed to a human. Then the holidays ended.  
  
* * * *  
  
What to think of this boy, Peter, was a mystery to Harry. He seemed to be such a disguise. Even when Harry could see him, which wasn't that often, his true thoughts were more invisible than anyone he had ever known. "It's not my fault," Peter had said in his own defense, "I had to hide my emotions to survive."  
  
As to what exactly the boy had been through, Harry knew even less. But, from what he guessed, it was a lot, and more than anyone should have to experience in a thousand lifetimes. For all that, though, he thought that Peter's aversion to being seen by any of the other students had more to do with a Moody-like paranoia than anything else. He was, he soon found, dead wrong.  
  
They were in the library, a place which Peter and Hermione together managed to drag the others to with increasing frequency, when the first of the returning Slytherins came back. Peter was out of the Cloak, but sitting in a shadowy corner almost imperceptible unless you knew he was there. He wasn't speaking above a whisper.  
  
"You wouldn't believe the dirt I've picked up over the years on every-" his voice broke off suddenly into absolute silence, no gasp, no fading away, just stopped.  
  
Harry, who hadn't really been looking at Peter, turned quickly to see what was wrong. The boy was gone, presumably under the cloak. "What is it?" the three remaining visible children asked in unison.  
  
No one answered. "Hello?" Ron asked, and he waved his hand around the space where Peter should have been. His hand found no purchase. Peter really was gone. The why was answered soon enough. Across the library, who had walked in but Malfoy and his cronies?  
  
"Talking to imaginary friends now, Potter?" his voice simpered. "Must be schizophrenic."  
  
Now did not seem like a good time to explain that he indeed was speaking with an actual person. "Right, Malfoy, welcome back to you too," he muttered as he, Ron, and Hermione took their leave.  
  
"Marauder's Map?" Ron asked as soon as they were out of earshot.  
  
Harry nodded. They made it to the Gryffindor Tower in record time; the map said Peter was in Dumbledore's office.  
  
"Well," Hermione grumbled, panting, "I could have told you that."  
  
"Could have saved us a trip then," Ron commented, also breathless. They went at a more normal rate to the headmaster's office. According to the map, Dumbledore was not there.  
  
"Anyone know the password?" Harry asked. "It's a candy."  
  
Hermione and Ron looked at him doubtfully. "Just accept it," he said, shrugging. And they started shouting out random candies, a veritable deja vú for Harry. Finally, the gargoyle moved, whether it was on Bertie Bott's Every Flavored Beans, Chocolate Frogs, or Pumpkin Pastries was anybody's guess.  
  
They found Peter immediately. He was sitting on the floor staring straight at the wall. His mouth was moving but no sound was coming out.  
  
"Peter," Hermione asked softly, "what's wrong?"  
  
"I told you; I can't be in the same room with those sons of.sons of.Death- Eaters," he spat the word as if it was the dirtiest swear word ever. "I can't.I can't." his voice dwindled to nothingness.  
  
"You mean Malfoy? He's nothing, just a lot of talk and ego," Ron scoffed.  
  
"Draco?" Peter looked up, anger flashing through his eyes before it faded into that weird mask of stoicism, "Draco isn't nothing. He's a murderer."  
  
"What?" they asked simultaneously.  
  
"You heard me perfectly clearly; you just didn't want to hear it. After all, as much as you might hate him, as awful as he might be at school, he is still a fellow student at Hogwarts. You don't want to think about them being capable of that kind of stuff. But they are. Riddle had his first kill before he graduated. Why did you think I couldn't stand to be near them? Because they are annoying? What do you take me for? But it doesn't matter. Just leave me alone."  
  
"No, Peter, you can't stay alone forever," Hermione sat down next to him.  
  
"Yes, I can; don't you get it? I am happy alone. Let me be." His lips started to move silently again.  
  
"What happened? Who did Malfoy kill?" Harry asked.  
  
Peter looked at them as if they were insane to want to know. He shook his head and stared past them, unseeingly. Hermione snapped in front of his face; he didn't so much as blink. "What happened?" Harry repeated.  
  
"Are you certain you want to know? If I had a choice, I wouldn't want to!" Peter cried, responding automatically.  
  
"Yes, we are sure," Harry responded for all of them.  
  
"Then you will hear," Peter consented. He stood up and resumed a seat behind Dumbledore's desk. He looked and acted presumptuous. Another disguise, another act.  
  
"I was twelve, that would make Draco eleven.Look, I can't do this," Peter broke off suddenly, and his blank stare returned.  
  
"Is that how you deal with reality?" Hermione snapped. "Just go away into your own little world of nothingness and forget what is actually happening?"  
  
"Yes! That is how. Give me another way and I'll take it, but I think the fact that I found anyway to fight what I must is impressive. So don't tell me I am doing anything wrong. I am more right than you'll ever be!" Peter became angry quickly. No, Harry thought better of it, It wasn't anger. It was a defense. It was another of those cursed masks.  
  
"And what has happened to you?" Hermione cried. "Harry has had his share of adversity!"  
  
"Yes, you are right. But he has also has his share of goodness. I respect you, Harry, for what you've been through. No one should have to go through that. And yet, he has had balance in his life. And nothing he has been through has been half as bad as my experiences."  
  
"Want to bet?" Harry bristled.  
  
"You'd lose. Trust me. You've felt the Cruciatus curse twice, I believe. Voldemort had to stop using it on me because it got too bloody boring for him, and for me. I don't scream any more. Can you say the same?"  
  
"You don't scream?" Harry asked, half doubtfully, half incredulously.  
  
Peter nodded, his defensive attitude taking control. He started to speak again, "Harry, you have somewhere in you the memory of your mother loving you so much that she would rather die than betray her child. I have in my consciousness the memory of my mother giving me to the Dark Lord. Not in exchange for her life. Not because she had no choice, but because she wanted to.  
  
"I know you respected my father, but I have never been hurt so badly as when I read the article about his escape. No one once speculated that he would be trying to find his son, who may or may not have died in the first rising of Voldemort. Instead, they quoted his delirious rambling. He's at Hogwarts. I, like everyone else, thought it meant you. After all those years he still cared more for the Potters, or their murderer, than he did for his son.  
  
"Is it any wonder I try to leave this world? This world has never offered me anything. Even when I wanted death, it would not give it to me."  
  
He rolled up his right sleeve slowly and shuddered at the criss-cross scars that streaked over his wrist. Hermione gasped aloud. "It didn't work," Peter said remorsefully.  
  
"Why would you try to kill yourself?" Ron said rather than asked.  
  
"Because I didn't know what else to do. I guess I am going to have to tell you after all. I wasn't the only little lost child everyone thought was dead. Apparently, Dumbledore is not very good at keeping track of them. There was at least one other. We called her Mary, after Francis Hodgson Burnett's The Secret Garden. Then there was Lucy, The Chronicles of Narnia, but she might have been a Muggle.  
  
"Lucy was wonderful. She believed in a world of goodness even when she was in that living nightmare. Mary and I were jaded. She kept hoping that someday things would be better. She was the one who kept us all alive. There were times when we thought her an angel. And don't think this is a case of rose-colored memories. She really was like this, one of those Victorian, storybook children; we should have called her Sara, from The Little Princess. But she liked Lucy more."  
  
"Because Lucy Penvensie found the way out, behind the wardrobe," Hermione butted in.  
  
Peter looked startled, as if he had forgotten anyone else was in the room, but he nodded appreciatively. "Exactly, Hermione, Lucy had faith even no one else did. Both Lucies.But the wardrobe was an adventure. It did not take them from reality. They returned at exactly the same moment they had left, only with memories."  
  
Then he stopped again. His face dropped its mask for a second and contorted with pain. Realizing what he was doing, Peter snapped back to non- expression. "Go on," Hermione urged gently.  
  
"You know what, I probably shouldn't tell you this, on second thought," Peter suddenly looked up, with a foolish sort of smile on his face.  
  
"Oh no you don't!" Ron said. "You started, and so you should finish."  
  
"You'll feel better once you've told anyway," Harry added knowingly.  
  
"Maybe I will feel better, but you won't," Peter corrected, "However, since you seem so intent on hearing it I will continue. Lucy was extremely empathetic. In fact, it was so strong it's the one reason we aren't complete sure she was a Muggle. It was almost supernatural, the way she could sense emotion. But she was young, very young, and she had no idea what the consequences of her ability could be. Neither Mary nor I had it, so we were of no help in that area. She was foolish. She cared far too much about people who she should not have. I have oft wondered if she was wonderful or stupid. I suppose she was a glorious idiot.  
  
"One day, O, Lucy, why? One day, Lucy tried to comfort Draco, from what his ill-tempered manner spawned matters not. All that matters is that Lucy overstepped her boundaries because she saw Draco, and all the other.incubi of Death-Eaters, as children. She once told me that one of the evilest things that the Death-Eaters had done was corrupting their sons and daughters. They were not evil by nature, and they were never given a chance to choose their own calling. I disagreed. I honestly cannot forgive a single one of them. How can anyone watch constant abuse and believe it to be right? Or even acceptable?  
  
"But that is philosophy, nurture versus nature. Lucy had much faith in her creed, and she became a martyr for it. Draco's petulance was due to pent-up anger. She, with her quiet questions, her concerned words, offered an outlet for it. I don't know what truly happened, for I was not there or perhaps I could have stopped it, but he stabbed her through the heart with a letter-opener in the end. He didn't even give her the honor and mercy of a magical death.  
  
"Mary found her body, still oozing out dark blood. May there never again on Earth sound such a horrible scream. It was the tears of a millennium bottled into a single cry. I was at her side before the echo had stopped. I longed, with all of my heart, to kill Draco, to get revenge.  
  
"Mary begged me not to, said that if I did my life would be forfeit. She was right; it would have been. At that moment, I did not care. But Mary pleaded, and her winning card was that she would die too. There was no hope for her with both of us gone. So Lucy's death went un-avenged, as she would have liked it. We grieved in silence for her, the mortal angel that now, we truly wanted to hope, had real wings of shimmering stars.  
  
"Six months later, they separated Mary and me. Where she is now is anyone's guess, but she must be dead. Why else would I not have seen her? Perhaps she escaped, but I doubt it with my whole being. When they took her, that's when I slashed my wrists. Dobby stopped the blood because he had been ordered not to let me die."  
  
Peter fell into mournful silence. No one said anything for a long time. Harry could not get his mind around the story. Malfoy had killed a girl in a fit of rage brought on by something irrelevant. Peter had been right; Harry would have been better off not knowing.  
  
"You knew Dobby?" Ron asked for the sake of having something to say.  
  
"Yes, but he would deny it if you asked him. Even now, with his newfound freedom, he would die to say my name, or any hints about my life, aloud. He offered many times to do so, especially when we tried to figure out how to warn you about the Chamber of Secrets-" Peter began.  
  
"You were the one warning us?"  
  
"I was trying, but Dobby had such strict parameters on what he was doing. He could not, under any circumstances, help Harry Potter. So I found a loophole, try to hurt you, but at the same time give warning. From what I gather, it didn't really work. At that same time, Dobby offered to speak my name, but I would not suffer another death on my soul. He came back several times after his liberation, but he could do nothing for me. I told him never to come again. I like solitude. Please, leave me alone. I need to be alone."  
  
His silent mantra began again. Hermione motioned for them to leave, but she turned back just before they left and asked, "You said that the reason Malfoy was upset did not matter. That's a lie. What was the reason?"  
  
Peter replied softly, "He was angry because you three had outshone him his first year at Hogwarts, and his father took no excuses for it. I told you that you did not want to know." This last was nearly an accusation.  
  
Harry froze. Peter's words rang in his head. Was he the cause of Lucy's death? Was it all his fault? How much had Peter been through on account of himself?  
  
"No, do not feel that way. If you could have prevented it, you would have. It was fated. One of us had to die, and of all people, it was cruelest to take Lucy. Of course it would be her, and of course it would be in a way that would haunt all of our dreams for eternity, wondering if we could have saved her. The answer is no. Never."  
  
Probably, Peter was right, but it did nothing to assuage Harry's feeling of guilt. 


	4. Erasable Evil

Disclaimer: I own nothing but Peter and Carolyn/Mary.  
  
Although the holidays had gone smoothly, the return of the bulk of Hogwarts students made Peter's path rocky. His past did not assimilate well to the present. He sat just counting the minutes, the seconds, until March 22. It would not come. It would not come. If he had been a Muggle, he would have been diagnosed with clinical depression, maybe even so far as schizophrenia. Everyone who knew he existed and cared that he live was worried that he might once more slash his wrists and end all hope. He disagreed, on those few occasions he returned from his eerie, silent reveries. He said that he would not die now, because he had the most magnificent chance for revenge that there ever had been and ever would be. "They deserve to pay in blood," he growled on one of his worse days. "They deserve to suffer more than any mortal can imagine, for eternity, and that will not begin to pay for the crimes."  
  
It seemed to Harry that Dumbledore was desperate to change Peter from his angry, vengeful self into someone, well, with no better word, someone good. He pleaded with the boy to recognize that murdering Voldemort and all connected with him was not the answer. It would not rid the world of evil.  
  
"So what would you have me do, Dumbledore? Would you have me twiddle my thumbs as the death toll rises and watch because murdering the murderers is wrong?"  
  
"No, but you must realize that it is not the solution to the problem. You will not undo their wrong."  
  
"Their wrong is done. We cannot help those that have already gone. Do you think that I would not pay any price to undo.some things?" Peter still tiptoed around Lucy and Mary.  
  
"No," Dumbledore replied softly, "but I do think you will act hastily and the world may wish that you chosen differently. You cannot act as other children. You cannot act as other wizards. You cannot even act as another human. In three months, if you are still breathing, the wave of your hand will create new constellations in the sky, rubbing your fingers will bring in the tide, and whistling will form tempests. What you will is what will happen. Peter, once you are great, there are none who can withstand you."  
  
"So what are you saying?"  
  
"Nothing except that you must take heed to do things for the greatest good and never do anything except what is right. You will change the world, whatever path you take. Change it for the better."  
  
Peter suddenly realized what Dumbledore was saying. It was frightening. He wished he had not pieced it together. Change the world. It does not undo the wrong.  
  
"Time. Am I the master of time?"  
  
"Yes."  
  
"Then I know what you ask of me, but I also know the repercussions of that action. How can you ask it? How?" Peter begged sadly. He tried to turns his thoughts from what Dumbledore wanted him to do, but he was unsuccessful.  
  
Dumbledore would neither meet his gaze nor reply to his queries. Peter left the room slowly, pensive and quiet. He needed to think. Yes, his mind told him, of course you could do it, but you would never want to. Never. It's one thing to say it, one thing to try it, but to mean it and to take that step that will never let you come back; that's different. But Peter also knew that what Dumbledore would not come out and say was the best of plans for the rest of the world. "Why can't I ever do anything that will be the best for me?" Peter cried softly under the folds of the Invisibility Cloak.  
  
He walked around aimlessly for hours that felt like minutes. His thoughts raged like tempests, out of control, rarely staying in the same place for two seconds. He couldn't concentrate on his mantras; he couldn't meditate. For the first time in his like he was not able to restrain his thoughts and emotions. Finally, after what the clock said was three hours, he sat down in the Great Hall for dinner, in a corner, without anyone taking notice of him. On his way, he snatched a chicken leg and a roll from the table. It was more than enough for his diet. Nevertheless, he would probably foist a few more morsels later that night. Why he even bothered to sit there and watch the real students eat, the people who belonged at Hogwarts, who were supposed to be there, was beyond him. It was fascinating to see how real children acted, he supposed, with their laughter and morbid complaining. He wondered often if he was insane, getting pleasure out of a world he could never take part in. But the answer was not to be found. Now, watching, he wondered something else. How many of these children had already been hurt by the Dark Lord? Many, and still many would be if he couldn't stop Voldemort. He began, in a flash of surprise, to understand how Dumbeldore could dare to suggest what he had.  
  
And yet, he knew he could not do it.no, he would not do it. Staring out at the crowd he saw with a pang how many would benefit if he but had the courage. But he did not have it. He walked rather quickly out of the Great Hall and curled up in a corner in the empty headmaster's office, thinking for who knows how long. He did not even stop when Dumbldore came in, merely throwing the cloak over him as the grinding of the stairs and gargoyles announced his arrival.  
  
Again, there was the sound of stone against stone. Peter looked up, wondering who would be visiting the headmaster, and whether he should announce his presense in case he heard something not meant for his ears.  
  
A short, brown-haired girl hobbled in on a crutch as fast as a normal child would have walked. Her face was grimy and her clothes were torn, but the dirt hid a perfectly healthy, well-fed face and the clothes were new underneath.  
  
"Professor Dumbledore," she cried grandly in an odd sort of accent, "I hear rumor that you are acquainted with one of my colleagues!"  
  
"Your colleague?" the headmaster repeated confusedly.  
  
"That's what I said, was it not? So, are the rumors true? 'Cause if they are I have a message for you to pass on to him, lessen he can come 'imself."  
  
"Well, who is your colleague?"  
  
"Don't know what you call him. But there be not many in my particular profession. Iffen you know one, it's probably him."  
  
"Then, what is your 'profession?'" Dumbledore asked.  
  
"Of late, I s'pose it's a bit changed, but we used to be little spies and ghosts. Got any of them lying around?"  
  
Peter, at this point, finally got over his shock and stood up, letting the Cloak fall to the ground. "You're alive?" he asked incredulously.  
  
"Aye, there 'e is. Miss me greatly? I'm awful sorry you haven't seen me sooner. I've got no excuse except that I wasn't the position to help. I'm glad to see you alive, but how you did it, I'll never know."  
  
"Same to you." The girl's swagger and mask allowed Peter to remember his own. "You got a lot of explaining to do, though," he continued, "those aren't rags you're wearing."  
  
"No, they aren't. I'll explain later, when the tapestries are clean."  
  
It was a code that translated to "When no one else is listening."  
  
Dumbledore stared unbelievingly at the two, but they ignored him. "So," the girl asked slyly, "What's your name? Your real name?"  
  
Peter said nothing, but a bit of one of his strange smiles played across his lips. The girl laughed hard, and a bit triumphantly, "I win! Ten thousand Galleons to me!"  
  
"Win what?" Peter asked, not remembering.  
  
"I guessed your name! Peter was the most ironic, or maybe the second most, but the first most was too presumptuous, even for you," the girl replied without hesitation and quite gleefully.  
  
"Yes, well, I am glad my name isn't Tom."  
  
"So, I win then. Ten thousand galleons!"  
  
"Yeah, congratulations, don't get to excited. It's not the end of the world."  
  
"Unfortunately," she replied with that same sort of humor that Peter all too often expressed.  
  
This was, apparently, a bit too much for Dumbledore, who stepped in, clearly annoyed. "Peter, would you like to explain?"  
  
The girl doubled over into a new fit of laughter.  
  
"Would you quit it with the 'would you like.' junk?" Peter asked exasperatedly. "Either way, I'm going to do it, so why don't you just tell me to do it in the first place? It seems like it would save a lot of people time and effort."  
  
Dumbledore gave one of his usual silences for a reply. Peter groaned; the girl rolled her eyes. They started to leave, both covering themselves in the Cloak.  
  
"Who are you?" Dumbledore asked again, this time not quite so patiently.  
  
"What's this, Pip-, I mean Peter? You haven't told anyone about me? I'm hurt. At any rate, I think I can explain rapidly. My name is Carolyn McKinnon; you might also know me as Mary Lennox, etc. Peter and I are very good friends, have been, will be; you know the drill. Do I need further explanation; seeing no objections, I am leaving with my friend now."  
  
"Carolyn McKinnon?" Peter looked at her quizzically.  
  
"Don't call me Carolyn that was girl I never was. Call me Mary, like you used to."  
  
And they left, leaving Dumbledore to figure out the rest for himself.  
  
The girl, of course, was the other surviving Lost Child. The one Peter had called Mary. Here she was, alive and just as swaggering, just as full of herself, and just as defiant as she had ever been. She was the female Artful Dodger.  
  
"So," Peter asked as they walked through nearly empty corridors, "Where have you been?"  
  
"Here, there, and everywhere," she replied lithely. "Mostly, I've been seeing the sights in America, hanging with tour groups. Forgive me if my demeanor seems American at times. You know I am far too good at assimilation."  
  
"McKinnon," Peter switched subjects, satisfied, "I know that name. Where from?"  
  
"My parents were killed by Voldemort. They were one of the great families he brought down. I still don't know why I wasn't killed on the spot, but I wasn't killed later because the Death-Eaters were afraid I'd pull a Harry on them and, you know, mak'em lose their power. You figure out why yet?"  
  
Peter nodded and briefed her on his situation. Then, he told her what his mind was still having trouble swallowing. "Dumbledore has a plan in mind. He's like Lucy; he doesn't want anymore death than necessary, and he very much believes that we are born to make our own destinies."  
  
"So what does he want you to do?"  
  
"It's not enough to kill him now, Mary. It isn't. The damage is done. Two generations are virtually destroyed, if not physically, mentally. There are so many dead. And so many more touched by those deaths. Stopping more from happening does not ease the pain of those who will never know their families."  
  
"What are you getting at?"  
  
"Dumbledore wants me to go back in time and kill Voldemort when he was still Tom Riddle, before he found the Chamber, before he made his blasphemous nickname."  
  
"He said this to you?"  
  
"No, but he might as well have."  
  
"So do it! Make it all right! There is no reason why you shouldn't! It's perfect; we can all be happy. We can do it again, and this time be children."  
  
"No, you don't understand the ramifications of me changing the world that way. Dumbledore does not only want Voldemort dead before he can perpetrate his crimes, but he wants.I don't know how to say it. If Voldemort is not around to do those things that he has done, then I will not be."  
  
"What do you mean you won't be?"  
  
"I am alive because Voldemort wanted me to be. My parents would not have had me if Voldemort had not willed it. By destroying Voldemort as a child, I destroy myself. I do not exist in a world without the Dark Lord."  
  
Mary put her hands to her mouth. "No," she cried. "I won't let you. You have to live; you can't destroy yourself."  
  
"Maybe I can. We've said it before. What have we got to live for? There's nothing."  
  
"There wasn't anything. But now, now there's everything. I've had a year and a half free. You've had barely a week. The world is glorious. Come see all the magic that isn't encompassed in wands and potions. Stand on the cliffs of Maine, see the Taj Mahal, Peter. You can't commit suicide now, when you're so close."  
  
"How is it fair that I live when people like Lily Potter are dead? How do we get away with being happy when there are so many who cannot be because of something that we could fix? Anyway, Dumbledore doesn't trust me. He thinks absolute power will corrupt me. What if it does, Carolyn? I will be the unstoppable evil."  
  
"But you're good."  
  
"Now, for now, I am. But what happens when the Dark Lord is gone. Is there any guarantee I'll continue to be this blissful little angel you have colored me to be? Dumbledore won't say it, but he views me as just as large of a threat as Voldemort is."  
  
"That's ridiculous! You are less likely to turn evil than Harry Potter is!" Carolyn cried.  
  
"No, I am less likely to turn Death-Eater," Peter corrected. "But they aren't the only evil entities in this world. I could change, even if I wanted to be good. What I want will be done, and that is far too dangerous a power for anyone to possess. Dumbledore already allowed one student to destroy the world. He can't let another."  
  
"Live your life, then do this foul deed at the end."  
  
"I have to do it while I still have the desire and the courage, Carolyn. I want to die now. What if that stops?"  
  
Carolyn nodded slowly. She, as Peter, had come to the same conclusion. There was no other way.  
  
"What if the world is better off now? What other ramifications could occur by this?"  
  
"Then, Mary, the new world must fix them."  
  
Mary started to cry softly.  
  
"What is the matter?"  
  
"If the world changes so that this reality is no more, then you will die with no tears shed and there will be beautiful eulogies for Riddle. Let me grieve now."  
  
Peter did not reply. His head was too full of other thoughts to worry about the oddities of his only friend. Before this conversation he had been sure that he would not kill Riddle-as-a-child. Now, he was sure he would. Fear crept in him. Someone else might have been afraid at the thought of wiping himself out of existence. Peter wasn't. After all, the idea that he had made it this long was a bit mind-boggling. He had called for the Reaper too many times to feel anything when his time had come.  
  
He was still insanely scared though. The world might be bad now, but there was still hope. What if Voldemort wasn't the worst thing possible? He started as a human, which meant that, somehow, he was conquerable. The Dark Lord wasn't the only source of evil in the world; everyone knew that. He was just the dominant one. What if his absence left the door open for someone else? Predicting the future was bad enough, but predicting alternate realities seemed virtually impossible. Still, why should he care? Maybe Riddle's death would spark the end of the world. It wasn't like he would be around to see it.  
  
But he saw Mary, still sobbing as if he was lying in state, and knew. The reason death did not scare him was that he did not care half so much for himself as he did for her, and the other half dozen people he had ever cared about. That was how he had lived through Voldemort's torture. Voldemort hadn't understood that his callousness could be anything other than self-preservation. But something had happened to Peter as a child. He never had control of his own life. Self-preservation was impossible. The only kind of living he could do was vicarious. Since before his memory, it had been more important that people like Mary survived.  
  
He could die. He was okay with that. Mary couldn't though. Mary had to survive, had to be, in the end, all right.  
  
He held her until she stopped crying, like a brother, nothing more. That's what they were, a pair of siblings tossed against unbeatable odds.  
  
And they had beaten them. For now.  
  
.  
  
a/n: Please just put up with me for now.and please review! 


	5. Unchecked Power

Disclaimer: I own nothing but the plot, Mary, and Peter.  
  
"My name is Mary. Don't call me anything else," Peter's dearest friend in the world announced to Harry, Ron, and Hermione by way of greeting.  
  
"Wouldn't dream of it," said Hermione, introducing the three to her.  
  
They were in Dumbledore's office, much to the annoyance of the headmaster who found it nearly impossible to do his work with an increasing number of kids camped out on the floor. (Not, he assured them repeatedly, he was at all unhappy to see both Peter and Mary in the world of the living.)  
  
"You could just let us into the Gryffindor tower and all these troubles would go away!" chorused Peter and Mary as the professor searched for a stack of parchment that Ron was currently using as a cushion.  
  
The simultaneous sentences were an incredibly frequent occurrence between Peter and Mary. It was all due to the fact that they had literally grown up with only each other. They could actually hold entire conversations in only a few words. Harry sighed as they began another again.  
  
"But." Peter began and never finished.  
  
"Never." Mary laughed a bit.  
  
"Stranger things."  
  
Mary glanced at Peter with a strange little gleam in her eye.  
  
"Wormtail," Peter seemed to reply.  
  
The girl's posture said that she agreed, but again only two words. "This place."  
  
"Bend them."  
  
Finally Harry, Ron, and Hermione cried out in exasperation. "What are you talking about?"  
  
"Isn't it obvious?" Mary asked, oblivious to brains on any other wavelength than hers.  
  
Peter who, apparently, had a slightly better grip on reality for who knows what reason, replied, "First I said that we might not belong in Gryffindor, and that if we wanted to get into a common room we should be sorted. Then Mary said that the Sorting Hat would never place us in anything other than Gryffindor. I pointed out that stranger things had happened, but she wanted a specific example. So I told her that Wormtail had been sorted into Gryffindor, although he obviously did not remain on those high standards for long, at any rate. She agreed and changed the subject to the fact that this place is a school, and therefore is occupied by students. It's a rule that only students, and heads of houses, are allowed in the Common Rooms. I said that the rules should be broken in our case."  
  
Then, the boy took a breath. Hermione stared and asked timidly, "All that in under ten words?"  
  
Peter shrugged. "It's not that hard, once you know who you're talking to.I bet that you could do it, if you really tried. Your conversations lose us sometimes."  
  
"But that is mostly because we refer to old events and people that you don't know!" Harry protested. "That's not the same thing as what you're doing. You're reading each other's minds."  
  
"So are you, in a way. You refer to past things and behaviors and assume that the others get the same metaphor out of it as you do. That is a type of thinking on the same wavelength. You just need to trust that your friends can think like you."  
  
"Trust me, we can't," Ron grumbled with a glance at Hermione.  
  
"Yes, you can, but you probably couldn't get down to ten words a conversation for a while. There was a time a few years ago when we could talk in syllables."  
  
"Do you realize you're doing it? I mean, can you talk like normal people?"  
  
Peter laughed. "Of course, we call it Short Speak. We invented it, or practiced it, I suppose, because we needed to be able to talk to each other without anyone else understanding what we were talking about. People thought we were mumbling to ourselves, not plotting and scheming. But it's very difficult because you can't let your mind wander to different subjects or delve away from a conversation, and you have to be sure you aren't assuming the other one knows something she doesn't.We usually speak in long tongue; we're not now because Short Speak annoys you."  
  
Harry smiled a bit at that, if only to humor Peter. The boy really was inscrutable, and they passed the topic of short speak. Then, however, the conversation got rocky. After all, there was very little that all of them had in common, unless you counted Voldemort, and that certainly wasn't what anyone wanted to talk about. Peter and Mary were agreeably silent about their pasts and steered skillfully, although obviously, away from any subject that touched too near hurtful matters.  
  
Peter had changed completely with the coming of Mary. His emotions showed just a little more readily, and he sounded just a little bit more sincere. Those masks that he had donned as easily as Dobby did socks seemed a little more translucent. It was nowhere near normal, but it was a start. If only, Harry thought, he could get rid of that horrible haunting in his eyes.  
  
He awoke from his reverie in time to hear Ron ask Mary, with about as much tact as a charging rhinoceros, "Why did you stay away so long, anyhow?"  
  
Peter and Mary stared at Ron with congruent looks of surprise and disgust. "What do you mean?" the girl asked in a harsh voice.  
  
"I mean, you must have heard about You-Know-Who's return, if you knew that Peter got out. Your source has to be good. Why didn't you come and help?"  
  
Mary looked absolutely bewildered. "I had to stay away because Voldemort had Peter.I cannot get used to that name.The last thing he needed was me showing up in the neighborhood. The Death-Eaters had to think that I was dead, or they would find me and capture me too."  
  
"Nice friend you got there!" Ron said, voice dripping with sarcasm.  
  
Now it was Peter's turn not to understand. "What are you talking about, pray tell?"  
  
"Well, no offense meant, Mary, but shouldn't you have tried to help Peter escape to?" Hermione said quietly.  
  
"No," Peter said. "Not at all, come on, one of you has to understand."  
  
No one seemed to.  
  
The boy shook his head in absolute amazement. "Didn't you learn anything last year? One is always better than two! What did you expect Mary to do? Take on Voldemort single-handedly? That is so pointless I can't even begin to say it."  
  
"She should have done something."  
  
"She did. She got away. I couldn't have survived it; I couldn't have stood up to him if she was there too. You know why the Longbottoms went insane from the Cruciatus curse? It was because they were together. If it had been one of them, then it would only have hurt.a lot, but they would have managed to come out of it sane. I think.If Mary had been screaming there next to me, then Voldemort would have got what he wanted, and you'd all be dead."  
  
Peter had spoken in a perfectly even tone, and his voice was that of a teacher explaining something to slightly slow students. His eyes were glazed as if he were merely bored. Yet, Harry felt as blown away as if he had screamed with anger. The emotion behind the words and the voice was so powerful, so all-consuming that it ate at Harry with a sting. It was actually hurting!  
  
"Peter!" Mary whispered suddenly, urgently, but somehow gave the impression that she was screaming hysterically. "Stop it! Stop it right now! Peter! Peter, it isn't their fault!"  
  
Suddenly, the pain in Harry's chest vanished. Peter's eyes became clear and he sobbed.  
  
"My God!" he said. "I didn't mean to.I didn't mean to.I don't have any control at all.I'm sorry.I'm sorry."  
  
Mary looked shaken, scared even. "How did you.? How could you.? Is it even possible? You're too young!"  
  
Her voice faded into silence. Peter looked as if he had just had a premonition of his own death. He got up hurriedly and left without looking back.  
  
"What happened?" Harry asked Mary as soon as she looked capable of human speech.  
  
"You have to understand that he didn't mean to do it at all, but he really doesn't have any control!" she said earnestly.  
  
"No control over what?"  
  
"His power, of course. It's maturing at too fast a rate. He was supposed to get it all at once, maybe a week before he actually turns sixteen he'll get little sparks on his fingers or something like that. Yet, it hasn't worked like that, not at all. We think it is his body's answer for the.the stuff he's been put through."  
  
"So what did he do?"  
  
"He was angry at you, and his feelings work in weird little ways. It saved his life once or twice, you know. I don't really understand how it works, but basically, he implants his own emotions into you."  
  
"So I was feeling what he was feeling?" Harry asked, thinking about the gnawing that he had felt in his stomach. He had never experienced anything like that before, the pain.  
  
"No, it doesn't work," Mary said. "What happens is the same thing as a Muggle rejection in surgery."  
  
And Hermione took up the sentence where Mary had left off, dawning comprehension on her face. "Our minds tried to get rid of the emotion. I've read about this. The result is a pain that can result in serious damage if it isn't stopped. In order to get rid of the invading sentiments, the body hurts itself to try to infuse any other sense at all."  
  
Mary nodded, completely nonplused at Hermione's knowledge. "If he hadn't stopped when he did, I am willing to be that you'd be dead."  
  
Harry thought back to that gnawing feeling. It felt like his insides were being carved out. He knew that Mary was telling the truth on all accounts. If Peter hadn't managed to stop inflicting his emotion, then all three of them would probably have suffered major damage. But Peter hadn't meant to? That was hard to believe.  
  
"I know the kid's been through bad stuff," Ron said after a moment's pause, "but killing us? He's got to know better than to do that!"  
  
"He does!" Mary cried. "You don't understand at all! He can't himself! It's like when you were younger, before you came to Hogwarts, and the little signs of maturing magic would hit you. He doesn't know he's doing it, and it takes all his power to stop it once he realizes it."  
  
"Why? Why hasn't his magic become manageable? He's old enough. Even an untrained wizard should have stopped by his age," Hermione informed them.  
  
"He's no wizard," Mary replied, relating quickly what was to happen when he turned sixteen.  
  
"That's wonderful!" Hermione cried joyfully. "He can defeat Voldemort! We'll all be fine!"  
  
But that was wrong, Harry thought. Peter couldn't be the one to bring down Voldemort. That was his job. The prophecy said so.unless the other possibility was true. He felt a weight sink in him. If Peter would do it, if Peter would kill Voldemort, then that meant he, Harry, would have to be killed.  
  
Mary saw Harry's reaction to the news, and said, "Don't worry, Harry. I think with Peter alive; all bets are off."  
  
"I hope so," Harry said dryly.  
  
* * * *  
  
As for Peter, he was wandering aimlessly around the castle, horrified at what he had almost done. Yes, he had done that sort of thing before, inflicted accidental pain, but it had always been on someone who deserved it. Someone like his mother. But he never had control. It was bound to happen these days, now that his acquaintances included non-Death Eaters. He was surprised he had lasted this long without incident. However, it didn't help the thought that he had just virtually tortured Harry Potter, Hermione Granger, and Ron Weasley because they had not understood that Mary had acted for the best.  
  
He was a danger to everyone until he got control, especially if his power kept growing meanwhile. He did not know what to do about it. He had to keep his emotions under control, but the fact was that he did. His real emotions almost never bubbled to the top. It didn't matter; his power kicked into gear at the slightest provocation of his mind.  
  
His thoughts went unwillingly to the last time he had lost control and not had Mary there to snap him out of it. He had killed a man, a Death Eater though it was. He still saw, in his nightmares, the man writhing in pain, and the blood starting to bubble inside the corners of his mouth, and he, Peter, not understanding in the least. And then when the man stopped struggling and the blood came dark and slow, Peter remembered how the other Death-Eaters had looked at him in a sort of fear mixed with respect. Voldemort, the one who really should have died, laughed.  
  
Peter had never done it again. There was something in his subconscious that spun away from the possibility of getting angry enough to kill. That pain that he had inflicted on Harry and the others was the worst he had done since. That was not from lack of trying.  
  
A girl rushing to get out of her class ran into Peter head on.  
  
"Sorry," she muttered and brushed by him.  
  
For a moment, Peter didn't realize why that had seemed so strange. The he realized it. He had forgotten his Invisibility Cloak. 


	6. Through the Looking Glass

Disclaimer: I own nothing. ::Inkling scribbles around on a piece of parchment, says a very complicated spell, and a weird-looking demon thing pops up from between the floorboards::  
"Who am I?"  
"You are the anthropomorphic manifestation of the disclaimer." ::Inkling then beats the anthropomorphic manifestation of the disclaimer to death with a copy of OOTP. She then gets sent to jail, upon which the judge decides that murder of a non-living idea is not actually murder, and she goes home to write more fanfic::  
  
---------------------------------------------------------------------------- --------------------------------  
  
Peter's mind worked quickly, as it always did. If classes had just let out, then the halls would be filled to the brim with students. The likelihood of him running into exactly the wrong ones was minimal, but still there. It was not a risk he was keen on taking, so he looked for other solutions. He did not know where he was beyond "somewhere on the fourth floor." He had never bothered with learning precisely where the Charms classroom, for example, was. There was no point; *he* wasn't taking any classes.  
  
He did know, however, how to get to 1) Dumbledore's office, 2) the library, and 3) the Great Hall from virtually any point in the school. Unfortunately, none of the above were anywhere close...  
  
He tried to remember the Marauder's Map. Harry, Ron, and Hermione had shown it to Peter a few days before. The crooked lines and moving points danced across his memory. He automatically erased the people. They were distracting him, and no one would be in the same positions now. The map stood out as clearly behind his closed eyes as it would have if he had been holding it. Peter's superbly photographic memory was not inherent; it was derived from years of half-spying on the still-free Death-Eaters.  
  
The fourth floor, he recalled suddenly, had a passageway on it. True, Harry had said that it was caved in, but maybe there would be enough room for him to squeeze through and wait for the bustle in the corridors to die down. He made his way hurriedly to the mirror. It opened easily at his touch, almost as if it had been waiting for someone to come along. Indeed, there was about three or four feet of floor before an abrupt pile of stones halted any further progress.  
  
The darkness inside was almost complete. Someone else might have lit his wand, but Peter was entirely unused to being able to perform magic. Instinct told him he could do nothing, and he did not bother to think otherwise. Instead, he sat, his back against the mirror, listening to the sounds of students about their lives.  
  
He had nearly drifted off to sleep when raised voices brought him to full consciousness. He kneeled and pressed his ear against the back of the mirror as hard as he dared. Whoever was arguing was just outside the passageway. He wasn't worried they would find him, but he was interested in what was going on.  
  
"Shut up about my parents!" a would-be calm, but angry voice yelled.  
  
Peter backed straight against the stones at the answer. He had heard that drawling voice a few too many times. Draco. But with the wall between Peter and Malfoy, he soon returned to the mirror.  
  
"Would you like me to show it to you?" a wheezy voice asked curiously.  
  
He spun around a few times. "Who's there?" he called quietly.  
  
"No one, dear, except for me. I'm the mirror. We can talk, you know."  
  
"Oh," Peter said, relieved, "right. You can show me what's going on?"  
  
"Of course, isn't that why you came? To spy?" the mirror said without any indication that spying was not an approved-of pastime.  
  
"No, actually, but now that I'm here..."  
  
The mirror became gradually clearer until he could see through it as clearly as a window. He ducked, hoping that no one had noticed his head peaking over the frame.  
  
"They can't see you, dear. I'm only a one-way," the mirror assured him hurriedly.  
  
Tentatively, he poked his head up. He saw, not really to his surprise, Malfoy, Crabbe, and Goyle surrounding another boy who looked only faintly familiar. His robes sported the Gryffindor badge, but beyond that he knew not.  
  
"Who is that boy? Do you know?" Peter asked the mirror, feeling stupid.  
  
"Well, naturally, with no one here to talk to you ever since the Marauders left I've had to keep busy somehow. He's a Longbottom, a Neville Longbottom."  
  
Something very strange happened in the pit of Peter's stomach. Neville...that was Neville Longbottom. Suddenly, he was more afraid of being seen by the Gryffindor than by any of the Death-Eater's children. He felt the intense need to open the mirror and apologize endlessly to Neville. Why?  
  
Then he realized that it was quite obvious. The reason that Draco was drawling those awful insults was because of Peter's mother. If Peter's mother hadn't...hadn't ruined Frank and Alice Longbottom, then Neville would have had a normal life. Peter's mother, though loathed be the term by both in question, was responsible for the misery Neville felt. Peter felt that guilt in behalf of his mother, who still laughed at the thought of the Longbottoms.  
  
Transfixed, Peter watched the scene unfold, barely taking in what was being said. Eventually, (and who could blame him?) Neville snapped. He shot one very effective curse at Draco, sending him spinning nearly twenty feet down the hall to land with an at once sickening and satisfying crunch, but when Draco got up there was murder in his eyes. Literally.  
  
He began a sentence, (probably it would have been around the lines of, "Why don't you try that again, you bastard!") but halfway through it, he disarmed Neville. Before Neville could even begin to react, Crabbe and Goyle both pinned his arms behind his back.  
  
If Peter had though about it logically, he would have realized that the chances of Draco actually committing murder in the middle of the fourth floor corridor of Hogwarts were virtually nil, but logic had nothing to do with it. The fact was that Peter could not get that ghastly image of Lucy, dead in a pool of blood, from his mind. More to the point, who could have?  
  
As Draco advanced on Neville, Peter made up his mind. He was not going to sit here and watch Malfoy perpetrate another murder. Or for that matter, be even indirectly responsible for any more misery on the part of the Longbottoms.  
  
He opened the mirror in what he hoped was a dramatic way. It slammed loudly against the wall, causing all four boys to stare at him. He remembered his wand at that moment and pulled it out.  
  
He heard the mirror mutter, "Some thanks I get."  
  
"Isn't it a little early to start you career as a Death-Eater, Draco?" Peter said loudly. "Or are you just filling in for your father?"  
  
What Draco thought about this statement the world may never know. He was, however, so surprised to see *Peter* of all people materialize in front of him.  
  
Peter could see his thoughts as clearly as if they were written on his face. Draco would have dearly loved to have said, "How the hell did you get here?" and probably about a dozen other questions, but he was smart enough to realize that actually *knowing* Peter was probably not the best game plan for innocence.  
  
So, the question turned into, "Who the hell are you?"  
  
Peter didn't bother to answer. "Don't play dumb with me," he hissed, liking the dramatics of it a bit, even if the situation was not entirely to his taste. "The world isn't exactly fooled by your, how shall I put it, 'purebloodedness.' I'm sure your father could attest to that fact. You might as well admit to knowing me. It's not as if we're in front of the Wizengamot, and I don't feel like going through introductions again."  
  
The fact that Peter could stand there and point his wand at Draco without cursing him into oblivion was somewhat of a miracle. With the possible exception of Voldemort, there was no one that Peter hated more, but years of stoicism had extended benefits. Peter doubted that Dumbledore would be overly pleased if Filch had to wipe Draco's remains from the ceilings and walls. He tried to be calm.  
  
Draco was far from it, and Peter couldn't quite blame him. Although he couldn't imagine that Draco did not know about Peter's rescue/escape by now, he probably wasn't expecting the boy to pop up from behind a mirror. He did, at least, recognize the futility "playing dumb."  
  
"What the hell are you doing here?" Draco amended.  
  
"Exacting revenge," Peter replied coolly. "Please, please go for the wand. It is taking all of my self-control not to kill you at the moment. There isn't a jury in the world that would dare to convict me if you mysteriously disappeared."  
  
Draco's face turned a little bit paler.  
  
Peter looked at Crabbe and Goyle, trying to avoid Neville's desperately inquisitive gaze. "Let him go," Peter said softly, his wand wavering just a little bit.  
  
They did so, and Neville backed a little ways down the corridor. He looked as if he was trying to decide whether a teacher needed to intervene. Peter didn't particularly care whether he did or not. He could handle himself, but he was neither afraid nor annoyed at the thought of a professor.  
  
Peter couldn't help himself any longer. He knew it was the cliché of villainhood, but he absolutely had to say it.  
  
"My, how the tables have turned!"  
  
This was the first time in the history of the world that Peter had the advantage against one of his enemies. The temptation to use it, to win once and for all, was overpowering.  
  
But he didn't; he didn't because he remembered Lucy. Lucy and Mary both swam before his eyes, begging him not to be vengeful, begging him to be good.  
  
He never thought that he was.  
  
That is, until he walked away with Neville, leaving Draco, Crabbe, and Goyle staring bewilderedly after them.  
  
****  
  
The next morning, Peter and Mary ate in the Great Hall without the Invisibility Cloak on. They ate at the Gryffindor table, though they had yet to convince Dumbledore to let them stay in the Tower.  
  
"Who are you?" everyone wanted to know, but neither Mary nor Peter were keen on giving history lessons.  
  
They said the bare minimum, but that, far from calming the crowd, served to stir up the beehive. The questions poured through like a broken dam. Peter would have found a way not to answer most of them even under Veritaserum.  
  
But the worst was Neville. Harry, Hermione, and Ron certainly had reason to hate Bellatrix, but the hate was canceled out because they had known and loved Sirius. That was not the case for Neville. All he knew was the Peter was the son of the woman who had ruined his life.  
  
He sat very still, very silently, like either a hawk watching his prey or a mouse trying not to be it (Peter did not know which) throughout breakfast. Peter could feel his gaze as if they were gimlets. Under the table, Neville's hands repeatedly folded and unfolded a wrapper. Peter wanted to say something, but there was nothing to say. Bellatrix was his mother by birth, not by choice.  
  
Finally, when the remains of the biscuits disappeared down into the kitchens below, Neville whispered hoarsely, "Thank you for...yesterday."  
  
Peter nodded mutely. The barrier of parents soon passed. It didn't take Neville that long to realize that Peter was nothing like his mother, and Neville, luckily, was not stupid enough to hate on parentage alone.  
  
"I'm a different sort of mudblood," Peter said.  
  
Neville grinned ruefully. "Only on one half of the family," he said.  
  
"All right, then I am a different sort of half-blood."  
  
And that was the last mention of Bellatrix Lestrange for quite a long while. The conversation fell to other things.  
  
"Why aren't you a student here?" Dean Thomas asked. "I mean, surely Dumbledore would let you take first year courses."  
  
"We're both about on level for our ages as far as theory goes, and we're beginning to put it in to practice," Mary said. "But, it's just simpler for the moment to stay out of classes. We'd probably start riots."  
  
"Come to our History of Magic class, please," begged Seamus, "we need a good riot. It might make Binns shut up."  
  
Hermione opened her mouth to argue, then shrugged in agreement.  
  
"That bad, eh?" Peter said, laughing.  
  
The group of Gryffindors launched into explanations of exactly how boring History of Magic was.  
  
"That's a shame," Peter said. "The actual history is really quite fascinating, you know. Well, come to think of it, you probably don't. It's too bad the subject has to be a sedative in class. Do you study it often on your own?"  
  
Harry, Ron, Dean, Neville, and Seamus stared at him as if he were insane, but Hermione nodded eagerly.  
  
"Oh, I try to get them to read," Hermione said with an exasperated sigh, "but they shy from books like a cat from water. It's a lost cause. Would you believe I am the only Gryffindor who has read Hogwarts, A History? There is one Ravenclaw seventh year."  
  
"Really. I would think that it would be a required reading!" Mary exclaimed, having pilfered and read the book about three times (if Peter's knowledge served him correctly.  
  
The two girls launched into a discussion of the finer points of the book. The boys moved subconsciously away from them and turned the conversation to more practical things.  
  
"So, Peter," Ron said, "do you play a lot of Quidditch?"  
  
Everyone stared at him.  
  
"Oh yeah, all the time," Peter said sarcastically, "Me and Voldemort against the rest of the Death-Eaters."  
  
"Oh, right, sorry." Ron turned a vibrant shade of scarlet.  
  
"Don't worry about it. I hear Quidditch is pretty interesting?" Peter said.  
  
The boys' faces dropped into looks of utmost horror.  
  
"Pretty interesting?" Harry gulped.  
  
"You mean you've never seen a game of Quidditch!" the others cried.  
  
"Well, it was on my to-do list," Peter said.  
  
"A situation that needs to be rectified immediately," Seamus announced.  
  
The next thing he knew, peter was being propelled through the hall out to the Quidditch pitch. As he passed the Slytherin table, he heard quite a bit of mutterings, but he paid them no need.  
  
Ten minutes later, the Gryffindor boys were trying to teach Peter how to fly on a broom, en mass. He couldn't hear a single instruction for the commotion.  
  
"One at a time, please!" Peter cried.  
  
The others fell back to let Harry attempt to teach Peter exactly how to fly a broom. Three hours later, Peter could sort of, kind of fly around a little bit. He was quite reluctant to fly any higher than ten feet. It would be just too ironic to slip and die in a freak broomstick accident after surviving Voldemort for nearly sixteen years. He wasn't about to try to throw that Quaffle thing through the ring.  
  
Harry and the others laughed, but good-naturedly.  
  
"Tell you what," Peter finally said, "I'll play Quidditch with you on March 23rd, the day after my sixteenth birthday."  
  
The boys agreed. Peter wondered if Mary had told Harry or Ron that there would be no March 23rd (hopefully). He didn't think so. If he knew Mary, she would not even acknowledge the fact that it was going to happen until it already had. She would just suffer in silence. It was better that way. He didn't need to give Voldemort any more incentive for catching up with him prior to that time.  
  
Soon, he got off the broom to watch the others play. It looked so easy and effortless. They started showing off after a while, making simple catches into breath-taking dives. Ron was doing superbly as Keeper, and, of course, Harry was just plain good at Quidditch.  
  
Nothing in Peter's life had ever been that easy. Every moment had been a fight against something. He tried, briefly, to imagine having an uncomplicated life or even an uncomplicated day. It didn't work.  
  
But that's what the fight was for, right? Making sure that people could actually have a carefree afternoon on broomsticks.  
  
It's just, and Peter felt ashamed even at admitting it, he wished that he could have that life someday.  
  
"But," he muttered to himself, "I was never meant to be, so I can't wish for anything."  
  
He had long since decided that, if there was a God, He had turned his face from Peter. [A/N: Forgive my angst!]  
  
"Good save, Ron!" he called automatically.  
  
****  
  
That night, Dumbledore was waiting for Peter when he came into the office.  
  
"I've finally figured out what to do with you," Dumbledore said with a small smile. "Now, of course, that you've decided to stop hiding."  
  
"Oh, and what is that?" Peter asked.  
  
"Forgive me for this, but I must admit that I attempted to look into your mind when you first came here, one night when you were asleep. I-"  
  
"No need to explain any further," Peter interrupted. "I was surprised that you believed me at all. If you wanted to try and verify it, I have no qualms, but I suspect that you didn't get much of a result."  
  
Dumbledore smiled again. "In fact, I have never come across so closed a mind, except, I believe, for one case."  
  
"Professor Severus Snape," Peter finished.  
  
"Well deduced," Dumbledore said, "but he, unfortunately, has absolutely no idea how to go about showing someone else how to close his mind. He learned to be an Occlumens under rather odd circumstances, and so his mind is closed in a far different manner than yours."  
  
"I still don't understand where this is going," Peter said.  
  
"If you're not going to be a student, Peter, and I already have a gamekeeper, then there is only one thing to do with you."  
  
Peter waited expectantly.  
  
"You're going to be our professor of Occlumency, a class that will be only offered to a select few."  
  
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A/N: All right, all right, really angsty I know, but bear with me. Something's going to happen to Neville, and I had to plant the seed for it here. Oh, and the Occlumency lessons should be fun!  
  
See that blue button, press it and say, "That was good" or "That was the worst waste of internet space I have ever heard of." 


	7. A Second Generation of Marauders

Hi, I'm back, thanks for the review Funness. Anyone else reading this, take the hint and review.  
  
Disclaimer: "First thing we do: let's kill all the lawyers." Or at least send a plague on those who would sue us lowly fanfic writers. JKR owns Harry Potter.  
  
Just don't listen to me...it's safer.  
  
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"A professor," Peter repeated blankly. "You want me to be a professor? Of Occlumency?"  
  
Dumbledore's smile widened. "Naturally," he said, "your stoic personality would be perfect for dealing with the 'insufferable masses' as I have heard the student body called."  
  
"If you put me in front of a class, the term 'student body' would end up having a slightly different meaning by the end of the day."  
  
Dumbledore laughed. "Don't worry. You won't be teaching anyone you hate. I was trying to get Harry to learn Occlumency last year, but it didn't really work out..."  
  
"Yeah," Peter muttered under his breath, "I think I noticed."  
  
Dumbledore glanced at him briefly, but continued as if there had been no interruption. "Professor Snape," he said, "was hardly the suitable teacher. Harry did not trust him and therefore didn't believe him. Plus, I can't imagine that Professor Snape made it any easier on Harry."  
  
"What makes you think I'll be any better?" Peter asked, stalling.  
  
"Between you and me, Peter, I think that anyone would be a better teacher for James Potter's son than Severus Snape."  
  
"Point taken, but will I only teach Harry?" Peter said, moving on.  
  
"Not unless you feel that is all you are capable of," the headmaster said, and there was something in his voice that made Peter realize he was going to have to suck up and be capable of it whether he wanted to or not. "Otherwise, I would like you to teach three others, maybe more if the need presents itself."  
  
"Let me guess," Peter said, "Ron and Hermione, obviously, and...er...Neville."  
  
Dumbledore nodded.  
  
"Professor Peter," the boy tried it out on his tongue. It didn't sound half-bad.  
  
"Now then, there isn't a single professor here known by their first name. We can't allow you to make an exception," Dumbledore said.  
  
"Well what would you have them call me? Professor Black? Professor Lestrange? Professor Lestrange-Black? No matter what name you choose, people will have me pegged for a criminal's son." Peter asked, laughing at the absurdity of each suggestion. Especially the hyphenated one.  
  
****  
  
That night at dinner, Peter wished he hadn't brought up the whole name thing as Dumbledore announced, not with out a tone of vast amusement in his voice, "May I present to you our new teacher of the new subject of Occlumency...Professor Padfoot jr."  
  
"You evil, evil man," Peter hissed as he sat down at the staff table for, Dumbledore had promised, one time and one time only.  
  
Professor Padfoot jr.! Of all things possible, but then Peter supposed that he shouldn't be too surprised. If the headmaster was strange enough to put a not yet sixteen-year-old boy in charge of an obscure branch of magic to teach four kids and pay him a real professor's salary to match, then a name like Padfoot jr. was probably a daily occurrence.  
  
Naturally, the rest of the school was a little more perturbed by the fact that someone their own age, not far from it, or younger than it had just been granted the status of professor. The disgruntled mutterings were impossible to miss even by the deafened standards of Dumbledore when it came to such things. The rest of the staff looked hardly more pleased.  
  
Dumbledore sighed and launched into a very long explanation (which, in most aspects could barely have been less truthful, on why Peter was the *perfect* candidate for the job). No matter about the lies, there would be a thousand rumors to match it by morning, especially if the Slytherins had anything to say about it. Finally, thankfully, Dumbledore either decided that he had explained things enough or gave up trying.  
  
Peter started eating far more than he had ever eaten in his life in an attempt to keep from looking at the crowd staring at him. Finally, he looked towards the Gryffindor table and quickly located Harry, Ron, Hermione, and Mary. Mary was laughing at him silently, and she gestured wildly, "Look to your left..."  
  
He did so obediently. To his surprise, such that he spilled the soup from his spoon, he saw one of the professors staring at him with the barest expression of loathing that he had seen since, well, since the last time Voldemort had looked at him.  
  
"Snape?" he mouthed to Harry and the others.  
  
They nodded vigorously back.  
  
Great, he thought, just what I need! A teacher who hates me on principle! I love my life. Strange, how one can be sarcastic even in one's thoughts. No matter, I just hope I never have the excuse to actually talk to him. Peter shuddered involuntarily. Usually, people hated him because, well, he was Peter, not because his father happened to be Sirius Black. He was annoying enough by himself without throwing heredity in the mix.  
  
He stole away from the staff table as soon as he felt that it was proper. Instead of heading up to Dumbledore's office, he went to his own office...with adjacent sleeping quarters. (His password was "Chaucer.") He had the nagging suspicion that half the reason that Dumbledore had granted him a professorship was to clear the headmaster's desk of random students.  
  
Harry, Ron, Hermione, and Mary knocked on the door about two minutes later. He opened the door with his wand and smiled to himself when it didn't blow up. Mary gave him a little grin, but the others were oblivious to what had just happened. Peter had, incidentally, cast his first purposeful spell. That was probably a first for *anyone*, to become a teacher and then perform magic.  
  
"Hello, Professor Padfoot jr.," Ron said, trying and failing to keep from laughing. "Can we call you Snuffles jr.?"  
  
"No, you bloody well can't," Peter snapped back a little more forcefully than he had meant to.  
  
Ron looked taken aback. "Sorry," he said, "but it is kind of funny."  
  
"Yes, I suppose it is, but...I don't know...forget it. Just, only call me by my lovely new name if you absolutely have to. Peter works fine. I won't take off House points for disrespect."  
  
Ron suddenly interrupted, "That's right; you can take off house points!"  
  
Peter nodded. "And give detentions. I'm a professor in every way except that you need an invitation to join my class. I'm like a NEWT course without OWLs."  
  
Harry and Ron looked at each other and rubbed their hands together gleefully. There was some sort of conversation going on in the gleams of their eyes.  
  
"And you say you can't speak Short Speak!" Mary cried. "What's up?"  
  
"Isn't it obvious?" Ron said.  
  
"Yeah, if Peter can take off points," Harry said.  
  
"Then we can get back at the Slytherins for that bloody Inquisitorial Squad they had going on last year," Ron finished gleefully.  
  
Peter nodded understandingly. "I don't think Dumbledore'd be to pleased with it, though, all things considered. But, you know, if Snape takes off two hundred points because Draco hit you with some jinx in the hallway, I'd be happy to reciprocate the favor."  
  
Ron looked sort of dreamy eyed, staring aimlessly around the still- empty room. "You know," he finally said, "it's true what they say. Power corrupts. I like it." [A/N: this is not a sign of things to come about Ron's personality so don't go jumping to conclusions. Lemmings know that this is bad for the last few seconds of their lives.]  
  
"I'm still not just going to take off points for the sake of their existence, but be sure to mention if they do something..." Peter said, finally conceding.  
  
Hermione, meanwhile, had been inspecting the office quite closely.  
  
"Are these your books?" she said after Ron stopped his happy plottings.  
  
"No," Peter said, "I own nothing but a couple pairs of clothes and my wand."  
  
"Weird," Hermione said absently, running her hands along the spines of shelf after shelf of old and tattered tomes. "Why would a professor's office come equipped with muggle literature?"  
  
Peter fairly leapt from his chair and hurried to the bookcases. Yes, Hermione was right, of course. They were *all* muggle books. He looked through the conveniently alphabetized rows and found what he was looking for.  
  
Inside the front cover of *David Copperfield* was a short note from Dumbledore.  
  
Dear Professor Peter Padfoot jr.,  
  
Enjoy. I still feel that is my fault that you have had precious little chance to do just that, so this is my way of apologizing. Not nearly good enough, all things considered, but it is all that is in my power to do.  
  
Prof. Albus Dumbledore  
  
Hermione gave a gasp and pointed to some handwriting on the title page that was definitely not the headmaster's. It was Charles Dickens's signature.  
  
"The man is insane," Peter cried, as he found that a good half of the books were so blessed. "This must have cost a fortune!"  
  
Hermione promptly grabbed a thick volume and began to read. "You have no idea," she said to no one in particular, "how much I miss reading fiction during the school year. Wizard fiction rots."  
  
"Not true," Ron said indignantly, "Marvin the Mad Muggle rules."  
  
Peter gave Hermione a sidelong glance. "I see your point," he said as he curled up in his chair with a dusty copy of Hamlet.  
  
****  
  
The next morning found Peter and Mary asleep over their books, and, in their opinion, that was a very good thing. Only with heavy reluctance did Peter traipse up to Dumbledore's office to see about his so-called "teaching schedule."  
  
In the end, it was decided that, as it had been last year, regular Hogwarts classes would take precedent over Occlumency. Peter's lessons would be held at night, which gave him a whole eight hours with nothing to do but read and wait for Harry, Ron, and Hermione to get out of class. Not, he decided, that this was, in any way, shape, or form, bad.  
  
Somewhat elated by the prospect of the day ahead, and, he felt almost ashamed to admit it, feeling a good deal of pride at the thought of being a professor, Peter strolled lazily back towards his office. Naturally, he still kept his hand tightly clenched over his wand, but that was just natural paranoia.  
  
As it turned out, he ran into, not Draco or one of the other Slytherin students, but Snape himself, just outside of the potions classroom.  
  
He might have felt safer running into Voldemort, factoring in the look Snape gave him. Harry, Ron, and Hermione, as well as the usual motley crew of Gryffindors and Slytherins, were congregated out in the hall waiting for Snape to let them into class. Harry gave Peter a meaningful glance that could not be mistaken for anything other than "run like hell and bolt your office door."  
  
But Peter was not about to heed that warning. Whether he realized it or not, he was just the slightest bit arrogant about the fact that not even the Dark Lord had managed to cow him. He certainly wasn't about to mar his perfect reputation by turning tail on a potions master, no matter how vindictive he might be.  
  
"Well," said Snape, finally getting over the shock of seeing his nemesis's son pop out from around the corridor, "the other boy who lived? Does he have a scar too?"  
  
Now, thought Peter furiously, what am I supposed to answer to that? I have plenty of scars, just probably not either of the ones he is thinking of. In the end, Peter went with what always worked. He said nothing just stared back at Snape with what he hoped was considerably less hate.  
  
Harry whispered to Ron, "Oh God, he's challenging Snape to a staring contest."  
  
"We're going to be here all day, mate," Ron muttered back, watching the scene unfold with interest.  
  
There was a long pause, perhaps a minute or two, in which neither party said anything. Although it has not been officially proven, that minute or two was also probably absent of blinks.  
  
"Professor Padfoot jr.," Snape uncharacteristically broke the silence, "tell us, are you very much like your father?"  
  
Peter barely paid attention to that jibe. He had heard enough bashing of his father in his lifetime. Since he had never met the man, he did not know what "being like his father" would mean.  
  
Apparently, though, Snape was determined to tell him.  
  
"Are you foolish, boy?" he said. "Are you stupid and rash? Are you quick to anger, and in your anger even more idiotic?"  
  
"No," Peter said softly, "I am not." It was the truth. Experience dictated that an absolute truth was the only thing anyone should dare to say in such a situation.  
  
"Your father was. That is why he is dead," Snape continued.  
  
It looked as if this was getting more of a rise from Harry than it was from Peter. Ron instinctively grabbed onto the back of his friend's robes, though Harry's fists had only begun to clench. Peter, however, again lapsed into silence. It was not an angry silence, as far as anyone could tell, just absence of any kind of reaction. It was a bit like insulting a wall. Snape tried a different tactic.  
  
"How kind of Dumbledore to harbor you, don't you think? Do you even realize that he is using you, that he really wishes that you didn't exist because than the danger that evolves because of you would also disappear? Or are you just happy to bask in the lies that you have created in your mind? Dumbledore has helped that along a bit by giving you that 'professorship.' Perhaps it makes you feel useful for now, and not just a weapon waiting to be used. I suppose you are glad there is something he can pretend you're good at."  
  
Now, it was time for another one of those truths, Peter knew intuitively.  
  
"I am good at Occlumency," he said very clearly.  
  
He let Snape dig his own hole.  
  
"I suppose you imagine that you are better than *me*," he whispered threateningly.  
  
Peter shrugged. "You said it, not me."  
  
Then he waited for what he knew was coming. Reformed or not, Snape's personality had once given him the Dark Mark, some of that still remained, and Peter *knew* how to deal with Death-Eaters. Sure enough, Snape pulled out his wand and said, "Well, there is only one way to find out."  
  
"Be my guest," Peter said and took a very deep breath.  
  
He closed his eyes and floated away into the fantasy worlds of muggle fiction. When Snape's Legillimency spell hit him, he barely felt it. It sort of slid around him, like water going around a rock. He let it flow for a while, enjoying the peacefulness of having a cleared mind, then forced the flood of magic slowly back towards Snape's mind. He saw a few glimpses of random memories (Snape was able to stop him from seeing any one snatch at once) and then stopped the spell. On his own terms, he might add, when he had never even taken out his wand.  
  
Peter allowed himself a slight grin of triumph.  
  
After another thirty seconds or so, Snape turned away and marched into his classroom.  
  
"Professor," Peter called after the retreating figure, "a moment, sir."  
  
Snape wheeled around and stared with the essence of impatience.  
  
"I am not a Marauder, sir," Peter said. "I have never been one nor will I ever be one. I am not my father, sir, neither, incidentally, am I my mother. I am myself, Professor Snape, and if you wish to hate me, then by all means do so, but do so on the grounds that I am my own person. The same goes for Harry. We may look like our fathers, but we are not them. Do not continue a feud onto the next generation, sir. That is how wars start, by hereditary hate. With all due respect, *that* is foolhardy, sir."  
  
Peter knew better than to give Snape a chance to respond. It would take a little while, he hoped, before the potions master would realize he had been insulted. He had spoken incredibly politely, nearly reverentially, and the honey-coated words softened what was actually said for a few seconds. In that window, Peter had put fifty feet and a corner between the two of them.  
  
He hoped it wouldn't have any unnecessary repercussions for him or any of the Gryffindors.  
  
****  
  
Potions class, Harry found, was both considerably worse and considerably more fun after seeing Snape beat at his own game. Although he managed to round off fifty points from the Gryffindors by the time the bell rang, Peter's confrontation had been priceless.  
  
For once, Harry was almost looking forward to Occlumency. If, that is, he could out-calm Snape.  
  
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A/N: I hope that you, too, are looking forward to Occlumency. That's the next chapter! Please be kind and review, or be mean and review, whatever. Just don't be indifferent!!!!! (Incidentally, Discworld novelist Terry Pratchett says that the surest sign of madness is using five or more exclamation points. He. He. He.) 


	8. A Strangely Closed Mind

Disclaimer: If you subscribe to the belief that all fiction is really a non- fiction that is taking place in another universe/dimension, no author owns anything, JKR included. Unfortunately, there is no space as of yet on the US Census for this belief, so I doubt anyone seriously subscribes to it. Either way, nothing belongs to me.  
  
A/N: And on with the show! One Occlumency lesson coming up.  
  
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By the time the appointed hour for Peter's first lesson clanged out on the clocks of Hogwarts, the euphoria of beating Snape so soundly had begun to wear off, though Mary especially enjoyed the story. Peter had finished Hamlet a mere five minutes before Harry, Ron, Hermione, and Neville came pouring through the door.  
  
They extended a few compliments to Peter on his doings earlier in the day, but seemed more eager to figure out how to do it themselves. Everyone, that is, except Harry, he hung back a little.  
  
"What's the matter?" Mary asked from her seat in the corner with her third book of the day.  
  
"Er...," Harry said, "I hate Occlumency."  
  
"Oh, I heard about the fiasco of last year," Peter said quickly, "that won't happen this time. Even if Voldemort was still actively trying to force his way into your mind, then our lessons still wouldn't affect it."  
  
"My scar hurt worse each time, last year," Harry pointed out.  
  
"That," Mary said, still immersed in her book, "is because our dear Professor Severus Snape was going about everything a bit backwardly."  
  
"So he was doing it on purpose, making my scar hurt and all?" Harry said, shocked.  
  
"No," Peter assured him, "not by a long shot, the way he was teaching you was the way he learned. Did you...did you ever see one of his memories?"  
  
Harry nodded glumly, thinking of his father.  
  
"One of his home life?" Peter clarified.  
  
Harry's first instinct was to shake his head, but then he remembered a little-boy Snape curled up in a corner while what looked to be his parents screamed at each other. He nodded.  
  
"Then you know it wasn't the best of possibilities. Snape's life was bad, but that, please remember, isn't an excuse for the things that he did. At any rate, he tried to make up for them. That is not the point, though. The point is that he learned Occlumency by being repeatedly hit with 'legillimens' and slowly learning to close his mind."  
  
"What's the other way?" Harry asked, eager to get away from the subject of a child Snape.  
  
"To learn first how to clear your mind and then how to keep it that way under the spell," Mary answered.  
  
"Who's teaching this class?" Peter called jovially.  
  
"Professor Padfoot jr.," Mary said.  
"Exactly," Peter said, puffing himself up mock-importantly, "and you would do well to remember it."  
  
"Or you're going to do what, pray tell?" Mary sighed, finally looking up.  
  
"No idea," Peter shrugged, "but I would appreciate it if you would stop interrupting me and just go back to...whatever you are reading."  
  
Mary nodded obligingly. "It's Victor Hugo's Les Miserables."  
  
Peter turned from his "class" to stare at his friend. "Don't you have enough misery in your life?"  
  
"Said the boy who just read Hamlet."  
  
They argued about whether Hugo's book or Shakespeare's play was more tragic for a while, Hermione inputting every few sentences. Harry, Ron, and Neville were lost within words. Finally Neville said timidly, "Ummm...aren't we supposed to be learning Occlumency?"  
  
That brought Peter back to reality.  
  
"Oh, right, sorry," he said, looking abashed, "we are going to learn how to meditate tonight."  
  
"Meditate, like as in guru-on-the-mountain meditate?" Ron said skeptically.  
  
"Nothing so strange, real meditation can be done in any position and virtually anywhere. Just let your thoughts blow out with your breath."  
  
"How?" Hermione asked.  
  
"Let's see. How should I explain it? Think of something small...a Snitch for you, Harry, maybe. It should be something that relates to you, but not an animal. Create the picture and then force your mind into it. If it was a Snitch, for example's sake, imagine moving, whipping through the air faster than a human can see, but never caring where you go. If you do it right, the rest of your mind will become blank. If you do it right, you will become the thing that you imagine in a metaphysical sense." [Disclaimer: this is the gist of the explanation of meditation given by Tamora Pierce in her Circle of Magic books; I don't own that.]  
  
"Then our minds will be closed?" asked Harry.  
  
"No," Peter said, "then your mind will be empty, and that is infinitely better than safe, though it takes more time to achieve. It is harder than it sounds though; try it."  
  
Harry closed his eyes, and, as Peter had suggested, he tried to force his mind into the shape of the ever-flitting Snitch. Deep in the back of his mind, though, the thoughts continued. He opened his eyes after a few moments in disgust. He saw that Ron and Hermione had done the same, but Neville, as in abysmal-at-everything-except-sometimes-Herbology Neville, was quite obviously in a meditative state. Harry would have thought the boy to be asleep, but there were no snores.  
  
Peter waited half a minute longer, staring at Neville confusedly, then began to talk again. Neville did not open his eyes.  
  
"Stop trying," Peter told the others. "The harder you try the less it will work. You have to want to meditate because you want a clear mind, not for any other reason."  
  
"Well, you know, if You-Know-Who is about to read my mind, then I doubt that is going to be my most pressing concern, clearing my mind," Ron said.  
  
"Once you learn how to do it, you will be able to fall into the process whatever your motive," Peter said tiredly. "Now, meditate."  
  
Harry took one more look at Neville. The usual embarrassed, nervous frown was replaced by a look of absolute peace. Harry wondered what it would be like, to not have to worry for a time, to be free of his problems, to not have to care. The image of the Snitch came unbidden to his head; Peter had said that the Snitch was always mindless. Fly this way and that, fly left and right and up and down and never, never care.  
  
Suddenly, he was in this intricate dance of nothingness, but he did not remark upon it. Later, he would realize that Peter had been right. He *was* the Snitch, and any other thought was absent.  
  
From a very long way away, Harry felt Peter shake him.  
  
"You were very nearly there," the boy-professor said with a smile, "very nearly, but not quite. You were still planning your next movement."  
  
"You mean there is more nothing than that?" Harry said incredulously.  
  
"Yes, but the fact that you were able to do that your second try is mind-boggling. Keep going. You'll have it soon, before the week is out, I imagine, assuming that you practice."  
  
Harry went back to becoming the Snitch, but he did not come so close to "nothingness" as he had that one time.  
  
Hermione and Ron, on the other hand, were much less successful. Peter knew exactly what they were doing wrong, but the only way for them to stop it was by exercising away the bad habits.  
  
"Ron," he said for the fourth time, "if you keep opening your eyes and looking around to see if you've done it, then you haven't. Just close your eyes and pretend like you're falling asleep."  
  
Less than two minutes later, Ron's eyes were staring around the room again.  
  
Hermione was concentrating too much still.  
  
"It's not a book or a spell that you'll be able to understand if you think hard enough, Hermione," Peter said. "That's the opposite you want to do."  
  
"I can't think of anything small that relates to me!" she cried.  
  
Peter thought for a moment, then said, "Do you know anything from a book by heart? You know, a poem or something, but not the whole book, that's too much."  
  
"I know some poems from muggle stories," Hermione supplied, "but I also know potions recipes and essays and spell theories..."  
  
"Imagine being the ink on a quill writing the poems."  
  
By the end of the hour, Harry, Ron, and Hermione had all achieved marginal success. Neville had still not come out of his trance.  
  
"See you whenever Dumbledore wants us to meet again," Peter said after praising their efforts for a few minutes. "Practice, please, if you have time. It will make it easier. Meditation is a habit, not a skill. Goodnight."  
  
Neville snapped awake.  
  
"Thanks for the lesson," he said, "I'll see you later."  
  
He left without another word, and the other three followed. Peter waited a few minutes, until he suspected that they were nearly to the Common Room and started to leave as well.  
  
"Where are you going?" Mary asked her book.  
  
"To see Dumbledore," Peter replied, "and you know why."  
  
****  
  
"The boy doesn't need Occlumecy lessons. He could teach better than I!" Peter cried upon seeing the professor.  
  
"What are you talking about?"  
  
"Neville! Neville Longbottom! Was that your idea of a joke, Professor? He's a walking, talking Occlumens!" Peter said forcefully. "Why would you send him to learn what he already knows?"  
  
Dumbledore's hands dropped in surprise, a surprising show of emotion from the old man. "What do you mean?" he said sharply. "Neville already knows Occlumency?"  
  
"Have you ever read A Little Princess, Professor?" Peter asked after a moment.  
  
The headmaster nodded.  
  
"Do you remember the part where Miss Minchin hires a French tutor for Sara Crewe, and Sara tries to tell her that it is pointless, but will not listen until she tells the French teacher, in absolutely flawless French, that she already knows the language?"  
  
Again a nod.  
  
"Well, I felt like that teacher."  
  
At another time, Dumbledore might have wondered where on earth this boy had picked up the knowledge of Muggle literature, but he was too busy digesting the fact that Neville was an Occlumens.  
  
"Look," Peter said, taking the silence for disbelief, "maybe I overreacted, but I told them to meditate and Neville was immediately gone!"  
  
"You didn't overreact, Peter. Sit down for a moment, and let me think," Dumbledore said. It was the first time he had ever seemed hesitant about anything.  
  
Peter obeyed, using the time to practice his own meditation. He came back quickly as the headmaster began to speak to himself.  
  
"It's strange...very strange. I had heard, but I had not thought it was possible. I thought it was just a myth...just a tale to frighten children...a legend."  
  
Peter waited. The next words seemed to be directed toward him.  
  
"You know the story of the Longbottoms."  
  
"Sir, it is one of the banes of my existence," Peter sighed.  
  
"Yes, but it should not be. At any rate, there were rumors and concerns of what might happen to Neville after all of it. How does the Cruciatus curse affect the womb? There were no studies, no known precedents, except for the old, unfounded myth."  
  
Peter thought for a moment. Lore and old magic, that was his specialty. Old magic had been a thing the Dark Lord hated, therefore his foe had learned about it. His mind sifted through old manuscripts and dusty volumes pilfered riskily from Death-Eaters' libraries. He found the match.  
  
"They used to do it to pregnant witches to make their babies stronger. They used to torture them because, supposedly, the pain would make the baby immortal, invincible. Of course, it was a lie and a lot of women suffered for an old folktale," Peter spat bitterly. "We are not so different from Muggles in that way."  
  
Dumbledore nodded once more, though this time with an air of gravity and sadness.  
  
"But there was some truth to it, wasn't there?" Peter pressed, trying to piece the puzzle together without the pieces.  
  
Dumbledore said, his voice barely above a whisper, "It must have changed Neville into something harder, having to withstand all of that pain. Even Alice could not have kept it to herself, it would have leaked to her baby. The pain must have made him impervious to penetration of the mind. It made him a born Occlumens."  
  
"I don't understand."  
  
"Neville is conditioned for torture. His very gestation was filled with it, so his body would not crack under it. He is an Occlumens as a secondary aspect. Firstly, his mind will never break."  
  
"An invincibility that he would give anything to share," Peter sighed, thinking of the way Bellatrix would gloat over the insane Longbottoms.  
  
Dumbledore nodded this time with a seriousness that made Peter's heart ache. Peter waited for the headmaster to tell him what to do next.  
  
"Go back to your books," he said. "I have to speak to Neville."  
  
Peter turned to leave, but as he neared to doorway he called back, without turning around, "If he's an Occlumens, then he might be a Legillimens, right?"  
  
"Yes, almost certainly."  
  
"Whatever you do, Professor, don't tell him that. Don't make it any easier for him."  
  
Peter left, not waiting to see if Dumbledore had understood the warning.  
  
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A/N: The "it" thing for Neville will become clear in less than two chapters, I promise. I love Neville, but I suspect that JKR might kill him off in the next book. I hope not. I think this is sort of my ode to Neville. Anyway, review! Please! The little button is right there and it is calling out your name. 


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